Strollerderby

I wish it had worked for me. About 3.5 years ago I returned to work (at an Internet company, which you think would be more cutting edge with its personnel policies) after maternity leave and asked for flexibility in my hours. I asked for part-time, job sharing, or telecommuting...and was denied everything.

So I quit.

They hired a replacement and then begged me to start working freelance because my replacement couldn't do everything I had done. Later when I had my second baby and stopped freelancing, they hired a second fulltime employee for my position. In other words, it took two fulltime employees to do what I had been doing alone.

I hope they regret not being more flexible with me. Maybe the experience has helped other parents at that company.

I have recent-ish (we have a 15-month-old) experience in this space. When my wife told her employer (Parkland Hospital in Dallas) that she wanted to work part-time after our son was born, their response was no. When she re-iterated that it was part-time or no-time, they didn't "accommodate" her. So my wife simply quit at the end of her maternity leave. My wife is a Registered Nurse with 10 years experience in labor & delivery, and Parkland delivers more babies in a year than *any* other hospital in the world, and Parkland is seriously understaffed for RNs. And yet at least one manager at Parkland was a complete idiot (no surprise there).

The article seems to paint the picture that employers are becoming more flexible, but I think it's possible it is reaching that incorrect conclusion by failing to recognize the self-selection component of the studied group: employed mothers. Those workplaces which do not provide adequate accommodation end up having the mothers quit, so they aren't represented in the study group. To balance this, let's do a study of employer accommodation where the study group consists entirely of mothers who no longer work. I suspect that the results would be very different.

I think often times those who ask for it know they have leverage to request it.  often those who really need it probably cannot get it.

i am one of the former and i did walk away from one job to take another that offered me what i needed in terms of flex time, but i also know i was lucky enough to have a skill-set that is in demand.

The take it or leave it proposition worked for me. I went from a 5 day week to a 3 day one, and as my former boss said, "I'd rather have you 3 days, than none." I realize I am not the mainstream. And you're right, it was easier for me to do this, as my husband is the primary wage earner.

I work for a large government bureaucracy.

I was the first one in my department to ask to work part-time.  My request was approved.  Then two other mothers and one father also requested part-time work.  Their requests were approved two.  With the cost savings, our boss hired another full-time employee.  Hiring another employee allowed are department to get more done.

Survey Says: Gen X Moms Get What They Ask For Posted by Melissa Summers on W...