Working families are the backbone of our community and our economy in Australia.  Parents At Work felt very strongly about the need to tell the story of working parents.  Specifically what happens at the intersection of work and family.  However their story is not being told in its full glory.  Working families are traditionally an under reported segment of our community.  There is data on specific elements that impact working families like work force participation, child care usage, broad demographic data, marriage, birth and divorce insights, but nothing easily accessible that combines all of these elements.

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I was shuffling my kids into the car one morning when I heard two crying children (not mine!!) and looked up to see a very hassled neighbour looking like he wanted to pull his hair out. I gave him a wave and a smile and asked “Having fun?” in an attempt to put a sense of humour into his clearly challenging morning. He was also doing the day care drop-off and it wasn’t going as smoothly as he would have liked. He responded to me with a roll of the eyes and declared “It’s one of those days!”.

I hear “It’s one of those days!”a lot

I fully appreciated his situation, not that there was anything I could do to help at that moment. I realised then that I hear this phrase so often, including from my coaching clients. Often at the start of a coaching session, I do hear that they feel like a failure today, or they considered postponing as they don’t have enough hours in the day, or they feel like they’re chasing their tale and need every spare minute. To their credit, they prioritised themselves and did not postpone, which will turn out to be the best decision they made all day.

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“Many men still feel they need to be the provider and gets them stuck in their roles… This is a universal challenge – how can we be a good dad and have a successful career?” Scott Behson

Working dads today are faced with unique challenges – as well as opportunities – that previous generations never had.  The pressures and expectations of what it means to be a modern father come from many angles – society encourages them to do more at home and workplaces (on the whole) haven’t changed a lot in terms of accepting men have caring responsibilities outside of work. Most women also have their own careers to build and therefore the caring and household duties need to be more equally shared, which changes the goal posts from men being the primary financial provider to so much more.

In our latest special event webinar Parents At Work interviewed Scott Behson – working dad advocate and US author of The Working Dad’s Survival Guide: How to Succeed at Work and at Home. Scott talked about how the family unit and more equality in the home is changing for the better however there are still some big hurdles to overcome before many organisations catch up to the family role changes.

Despite the changes that still need to be made there is still much dads can do to help them manage a successful career and be a present, emotionally connected father.

9 top practical tips for how the working dads of today can achieve work-life balance

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Parents At Work recently hosted a panel webinar for HR and diversity professionals to support organisations to develop a successful parental leave program. Invaluable and insightful for people leaders, this webinar dug deep into the heart of two national organisations who shared some of the initiatives they have implemented to help parents navigate parental leave and beyond.

Catherine McNair, National Diversity and Inclusion Manager at Deloitte and Maree Morgan-Monk, Head of People and Culture at Peoplecare joined Emma Walsh, CEO of Parents At Work to deliver the best practice tips of these two quite different companies.

There was much to savor in this webinar and it is well worth a listen for any CEO, HR or Diversity professional looking for a strategy or best practice advice on getting started with a parental leave program or the ‘how to’ of creating family friendly workplace of the future. (If you would like a recording visit this link and you will be given instant access to the slide pack as well as the interview itself.)

What was covered?

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