[MUSIC]
In the future, it will not be so odd for
people who are raising children to have part time jobs,
both of them and that that will be seen as a normal thing to do.
So, I'm very optimistic that change will come.
Even if you're not planning to have a spouse and your own children,
you're still part of a family.
And one of the topics we have, actually, is elder care.
How are you going to be dealing with your parents when they get older?
And just about everybody has parents, so [LAUGH] family writ large.
Your family of origin, your family nuclear family that you may start or
have already started.
How are you going to balance work and family in your life?
Balance maybe the wrong word because probably there is no balance.
So how are you going to combine them?
How are you going to have a satisfying family life and a satisfying career.
[MUSIC]
Often somebody says, well my mother is going to come and
take care of the kids while I work.
And I always think okay, have you asked your mother and often they had not.
So I say, well, the first step of your plan is to ask your mother.
[LAUGH] Some of them come back the next session and say, my mother says no thanks,
been there done that, I'm not going to be taking care of your children.
So it's a chance for people to be real.
And also, with regard to elder care.
Generally, we have very generous people in the class who say
that what they'll do when their parents or
parent needs care is they'll bring that parent into their house.
And I say, well, do you know if that's what your mother or your father or
your mother-in-law wants?
Well, no, we haven't had that conversation.
Well, have that conversation.
And again, oftentimes, the parent does not want that.
[MUSIC]
There are still women,
including women who are about to get an MBA who want to take time out.
Who don't want to come back to work.
And often they're the ones who feel deviant.
Because after all they've got an MBA.
And presumably they went for that degree because they want to work.
But then they have a child and they want to take some time off.
So the question of how you take time off, how much time you take,
and most important what you do while you're out.
Namely you better keep your networks up and
you better keep your hand in the business.
So you know what's going on because if you actually disappear totally for
five years or ten years, for sure.
You're going to have a lot of trouble coming back.
[MUSIC]
It's really a family decision because if she leaves the workforce,
unless your family is independently wealthy,
there's going to be a lot more pressure on you, the man.
So you should know that, and you and
she should talk about this, and how long is she going to be out for, and
what's she going to do to keep her finger in it while she's out?
And maybe the two of you want to have a different conversation which is not,
when should she leave and how she should come back.
But maybe you want to talk about what the two of you can do so
that you can both stay in.
Perhaps you're going to put more money into hiring a nanny.
Or you're going to make it worthwhile for
your mother-in-law to play a bigger role here.
Maybe your wife can work part time.
Maybe you can both work part time.
Anyway we're trying to increase the number of options that people have and make
it a family decision rather than the woman just saying this is what I want to do.
[MUSIC]
You can't possibly plan everything out.
You don't know if a child that you have will be a special needs child,
in which case all of your planning is for not.
Because that child is going to take precedence,
your decisions are all going to be about how to help that child and
planning, or there's a death of a spouse, in which case everything is different.
Or even a divorce that you didn't see coming.
So I think planning is a very good thing, but
everybody should understand that, what's the old saying?
Man plans and God laughs.
You just can't possibly plan out everything.
[MUSIC]
What are you going to do in the place where you work?
In a large corporation, in a small startup, what are you going to
do personally to help other people to balance work and family?
How are you going to change policies about family leave?
What are you going to do about childcare for your employees and
the people you manage?
I remember one guy saying you know I told her
when she comes back she doesn't have to have her old job back,
she can be in a much easier job with less travel.
And in general there's at least one women student in a class raised their hand and
said I don't want that.
When I come back I want to be just treated the way I was before.
I want the travel.
I want the promotions.
And so men and women get to see that not everybody has the same view here.
Some women want to come back and take a slower role for a while,
and some don't and the only way to know this is to actually have a face to face
conversation [LAUGH] with the employee, when she's ready to come back.
What is it that you see for yourself.
And the other thing they learn is that what you say when you're pregnant and
you've never had a child before, may be different from what you say when you have
had the child, particularly if the child has a problem of one sort or another.
And so again, people see that and they learn from each other.
They see what a wide variety of experiences people have.
[MUSIC]