It’s the first week of school for many families across the country today. For some parents this is a sad, end of summer farewell. For others, it’s a cause for celebration. Moms gone wild memes will dominate the internet this week.
I fall somewhere in between. And it’s all relative to amount of guilt I feel. Yep. Our familiar friend, parent guilt.
I lament the road trips we didn’t take this summer, the days I pushed off the pool and took zoom calls. I let the kids play hours of Fortnite so that I could work uninterrupted. I served corn dogs and ramen. Many days I felt like I was failing. I was neither an excellent leader nor was I an attentive parent.
"Summer 2021 was an extension of the 2020-2021 school year. I was the season that wasn’t.
I was burned out from parenting before the
3-month summer parenting marathon even started."
So, I’m glad they are off to class. I can work without guilt.
But by noon today the guilt reappears. I want to see them during my breaks. I want to take them to lunch.
It seems I'm never doing the right work.
What a messed up whirlwind of emotions!!!!
The first week of September is like my new year. I don’t make January 1 resolutions. Instead, the back-to-school week is my time of renewal. I can focus on myself. My adultness, my work, my health, myself.
I can show up like the leader I want to be.
This is a touchy subject for me. It’s rooted in fierce feminist beliefs. I see how divided our parenting and working culture still is. I feel some hope. I lead a younger staff with millennial values, and it now isn’t only impacting women. I am glad for that. But I don’t see a lot of sustainable solutions out there yet. Culture change takes time and purposeful leadership.
I’m also glad to see that hybrid work environments seem to be more forgiving of the interplay of home and work life. Cats on your keyboard and toddlers in your camera are becoming more normalized.
I think this work/life blend is harder for women though. Working women have been conditioned to hide and silence our personal lives at work.
I know that many women reading this have hidden a pregnancy at work, given their feverish child Tylenol to get in 3 hours, bribed a child to stay silent during a conference call, lied to a supervisor to go to your child’s recital.
I’ve spent all summer hiding the kids.
And now I’m glad they are away.
I want to lean into the messy blend of it all and be more forgiving. But my past experiences make me very hesitant to take that leap. Is it professional? Will I be judged? Can this new forgiveness be real?
What a scary but wonderful opportunity to reframe our working lives and shed some guilt. To do so, our organizations will need to create safety though clear expectations and honest communication.
As a coach I work with teams to break down these types of issues that lie hidden and derail progress, cultural advances, and retention. I use my personal and professional experiences to facilitate conversations that bridge gaps between leadership styles, generational biases, and personality types.
Coaching elevates every person in an organization.
What would it be like to work in a space like that???
Curious? Schedule a free consultation call to learn more about coaching with me:
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