Coaching Mums Blog

Back to School! How to Juggle Work and Family With School-Aged Children

Sat, 04 Sep 2010 08:17:00 GMT

It’s almost that time of year again, and whether you have older children or little ones just starting out, September can be an exciting and nerve-wracking time for both parents and kids! Despite the big build-up to the September send-off, the school year is a long ten months that requires continued parental management and involvement. As a working mum, you might find yourself overwhelmed with the responsibility of overseeing your own career and obligations as well as those of your kids. Planning lunches, meeting teachers, and chauffeuring your kids to ballet practise and piano lessons can leave you feeling as though you’re balancing on a tightrope in a three-ring circus! When you do feel a bit loony and in need of a good vent, make sure you’ve got an Online Coaching website bookmarked for some aid and support! In the meantime, with some careful preparation, you and your kids can look forward to a happy school experience year-round! Follow the helpful pointers below to make your year a success.

Keep Contact with the Classroom
Maintaining a relationship with your son or daughter’s school can help you keep you abreast of all developments that affect your child’s education. If possible, meet the teacher a week or two in advance especially if your child is young as introducing them to their new classroom ahead of time can help ease any fears or anxieties they might have. If the school has a curriculum or calendar available, take one and keep it handy to follow along with your child’s progress. Keep track of any questions or concerns and address them at Parent-Teacher interview nights, but ask your teacher to contact you earlier should any significant problems arise. Finally, plan on attending PTA meetings regularly, and if time allows, volunteer to help with school fundraisers or bake sales. Getting acquainted with the other parents and kids lets you know who your child is socialising with while allowing you to make new contacts and friends on the side!

Bring the Classroom Home
The key to a successful school year is organisation and communication. Involving your children in planning and decision-making validates their opinions and gives them a sense of control over their educational experience. Before school begins, get them to help you set up a homework-station where they’ll feel comfortable studying. Stock the area with supplies and storage tools to keep school work and clutter filed and ordered. Create a large wall calendar for parents and kids to keep track of holidays, tests, and extra-curricular activities. Each Sunday, gather everyone together to review the upcoming week’s schedule and make planning a fun family affair!

Have a Plan of Action
We all know that we can’t plan for everything. Your after-school baby-sitter might cancel last minute if she’s stuck in bed with a sudden bout of the flu, or your latch-key child might forget his key on the bus ride home. It’s important for you and your kids to discuss potential emergencies and have a plan of action at the ready. Keep the lines of communication open and periodically check in with your kids to see if they’ve got concerns. As busy working mums, we might still find ourselves apprehensive about the school routine, worrying that homework might go unfinished or that Susie’s not getting enough one-on-one time with her teacher. Add that to your Monday morning deadline and Wednesday’s marketing presentation, and you’ve got a lot on your hands and mind! When the responsibility seems unmanageable, that’s the perfect time for some Professional Coaching. To find out how your life can change by working with a coach, book your free 30-minute coaching call with me.

What are your tips for back-to-school success? Please comment below, I'd love to hear from you.

10 Top Tips from a man on staying young, happy and keeping your relationship alive:

Sat, 04 Sep 2010 06:49:00 GMT

I hope you enjoy these 10 tips written by my husband Chris, to help you have a strong, healthy and happy relationship!

1. Sing and dance
If you were to peep through our front window on most days, you’d see me, Max, Freddie and Amanda (collectively and individually) bopping around to a music track, or trying to remember the lyrics to a Robbie Williams song that Max has been brainwashed into singing whilst in the car on the way to nursery. It feels entirely natural to be dancing when I feel like it (but I have to be very careful not to start doing it at work…….or then again!). It’s part of being a child, and sharing the enjoyment of music, so whether it’s Robbie Williams or Vaughan Williams, get those hips and tonsils active!

2. Listen to each other
Sounds a bit obvious this one, but we expend an enormous amount of energy trying to get ourselves heard, when really we should be diverting that energy into listening more, and appreciating what each other says and does. This goes for listening to partners, children, friends, colleagues and yes, your innermost thoughts. Expending less negative emotional energy lowers the stress, is less tiring, and keeps my skin looking young and wrinkle-free!

3. Look for ways of having fun
It’s oh, so easy to be driven by the trials and tribulations of daily existence. Don’t take life so seriously and feel free to do the things that you enjoy yourself, and that you enjoy doing with your partner, family and friends. One of the hardest parts to doing this is giving yourself permission to indulge yourself in enjoyment, and, dare I say it, giving others the permission to do likewise. If, like me, you occasionally enjoy yourself by doing nothing, then go ahead and do nothing (just get permission first!)

4. You don’t always need to argue
Even though I know I’m always right, it doesn’t mean that it’s sensible to argue the point every time. One thing I’ve learned is that it helps to laugh (at the right point) during an argument, to take the heat out of the situation. Never go to bed without making up, and that goes for children and partners alike. I spent many years not following that piece of advice, and it wasn’t a nice way of living my life.

5. Celebrate what you’ve got
…..which might not always be a lot, but it’s yours so make the most of it. So the bedroom wall might not be painted, and you haven’t got a lot of wardrobe space but hey, you’ll do it eventually! The point is that we can worry about what we haven’t done, or what we need to do in the future, which stops us from really appreciating and celebrating what you’ve got in the here and now.

6. Learn from each other
I have a bit of experience of life! However, I’ll be the first to say how much I’ve learned from Amanda in different ways to deal with situations with Max. My own father came from the Genghis Khan school of parenting and while I’m pleased to say I didn’t follow in those particular footsteps, my tolerance levels weren’t great. Humility is a wonderful thing – never think you know so much that you can’t learn from a loved one. I’ve learned from Amanda how to deal with Max’s little foibles in a more emotionally intelligent way, and I hope she’s learned some things from me (e.g. babies bounce)

7. Have confidence in yourself
One thing I’ve learnt over the years is that one needs to trust one’s instincts. There are plenty of people who will be queuing up to give advice on everything from bringing up children to the secrets of a happy marriage. There does come a point where you should trust your instincts because when you do (and it works) it is a very uplifting experience. You DO know best more often than not, and if you combine listening, learning and doing, you will feel so much happier about yourself, and your abilities as a parent.

8. Know your own (and each other’s) limits
I believe we all know when others have over-reached themselves (or are in danger of doing so), but it’s much more difficult to recognise that point for ourselves. More often than not, the crunch comes when we try to cram too much into too little time, and end up frazzled, or dissatisfied because we haven’t achieved all the myriads of things that we’d thought we could do. My own experience is that this normally leads to arguments!!

The simple solution is to be honest with ourselves and recognise what it is that we do to cause the issue in the first place. Having done this, then at least we have the opportunity to do something about it. Try and give yourself more time to do things, or don’t try and do so much in the first place!! I find that this lowers the stress levels tremendously (and keeps my skin clear …..etc. etc.!!).

The same is true in being honest about what our partners, children, and friends do that is sure to end in tears. It’s always a difficult one to address, but a bit of honesty goes a long way.

9. Line up your supporters (AKA asking for help when you need it)
I know that Amanda has waxed lyrical on the benefits of having a support network. Speaking as someone who has found it difficult in the past to ask for help (having had parents who just expected me to go ahead and do things), I have wasted many hours trying to resolve issues that with support could have been sorted. Recently I had a situation at work that demanded that I seek help from supportive colleagues, and when I did, the effect was amazing. I was able to place the issue in the right perspective, and also (more importantly) see that I was right in the approach I was taking.

The bottom line is that we all need help, and having the people around that will support you is vital. So screw your courage to the sticking place (to quote the Bard), and ask!

10. The final one is always the most difficult
We all make mistakes at times. They might be small ones, like forgetting to get the turkey, or they might be big (I’ll let you fill this one in but it could be something to do with a turkey). Whatever they are, learn from them, or if you’ve been affected by someone else’s mistake, forgive! None of us are perfect (gosh, I hear you say…. not even you Chris?), so accept that we are all human and therefore fallible, and celebrate the positives in ourselves and others.

All in all, we have a lot to celebrate (I know I have)!!

If you liked today’s blog post, please spread the word. If you have tips you would like to share on how you keep your relationship going strong, please comment below.

How to Reduce Work Related Stress as a Working Mum

Thu, 05 Aug 2010 18:09:00 GMT

Working mothers recognise the value in maintaining a career outside of the home. Aside from the financial benefits of a regular pay cheque, work provides women with a sense of identity, purpose, and passion apart from our maternal and domestic roles. Yet, as working mothers, we also face the dual burden of “second-shift” work, meaning we often suffer from burnout and the tendency to overextend ourselves. While a certain amount of stress can be a positive motivator, overexertion is dangerous and leaves women feeling overwhelmed and at the brink of insanity. How can working mums reduce their stress levels and avoid burnout? Seeking professional coaching will help you ditch the guilt and stop the burnout. But in the meantime, to take control of all that life throws your way, try the following tips to help release tension and improve your mood.

Practice good task management. Prioritise, delegate, and break down into manageable bits. Repeat as needed. These three keys to work-related stress relief will help reduce your workload and tame what may seem like the impossible. Set no more than two to three priorities per day and before punching out, revise accordingly. Sticking to a few will keep you focused and confident—yet, be careful of becoming overly confident! No matter how much we want to maintain a superwoman image, sometimes we simply can’t do it all ourselves. If you find your to-do list is backlogged, it’s time to delegate. Hand over some of your workload and excel in the projects that matter. And, if large projects still inspire trepidation, break them down into bite-sized chunks. Not only does this cut the fear factor, but dividing tasks leaves you feeling you’ve accomplished more and in less time.

Be nice. Don’t be a pushover. In striving to make a good impression at the office, we often want to come across as nice. But beware! The way we choose to define “nice” may get us the exact opposite of what we had desired. One of the traps many working mums fall into is the red zone of extreme niceness, also known as pushover territory. The trick is to learn how to be pleasant and accommodating without being a doormat. Assert your right to just say “no.” If guilt plagues your worried conscience, invoke the cause of your good health and sanity to remind you that saying no is not a negative!

Take a cue from your kids, and play! When you punch out, make sure to leave your work at the office and make time for play each evening. Take up a new hobby, read your favourite magazine, or take the family and dog for a walk. Play time reinvigorates the soul, gets the creative juices flowing, and beats the boredom of your work routine.

See a professional. As the old adage goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure. Watch for the signs of stress, and keep them in check before they get out of hand. Being proactive will maintain balance and calm in your busy lives and can minimize the effects of office-related stress. Symptoms range from the emotional to the physical and can include insomnia, digestive problems, loss of focus, pain or illness, and moodiness. Have routine physicals to check up on heart health and notify your doctor of any unusual pains or discomfort.

But help doesn’t have to stop at your G.P’s office. Why not sign up for some online coaching? If you’re finding the stress is too much to handle, professional coaching can support working mums who finds themselves constantly torn between work and home life.

Seven Principles of Balance, Part 2

Thu, 05 Aug 2010 18:14:00 GMT

Several weeks ago I wrote part one of a blog post entitled “Suffragettes, Sinatra and Pants: Your First Three Principles of Work Life Balance” with the intention to send you part two in the following issue. Then something inspired me and I wrote about that for the next issue. Having already written part two, I completely forgot to post it. It wasn’t until my sister in-law, Denise mentioned it to me last week, telling me how much it had helped her friend to breathe a relieved sigh of, “Oh, I’m doing ok and I’m not the only one”, Denise also told me that she seemed to have missed part two, and it was then that the penny dropped! I hadn’t posted part two!!

Signs of a slightly deranged mind? Or just that of a working mum? :)

So here are your last four principles of balance, illustrated with the aide of John Major, a desert island and a Ferrari. Yes perhaps it is a deranged mind!

1.   No woman is an island
It’s crazy to expect yourself to run a home, a family and a career without support. It’s worth remembering that the current family model has less support now than previous generations when fewer women worked. Now that we “have it all”, we find that we also have to “do it all”!

Realise that you simply can’t have a balanced life by doing it all by yourself, as this contradicts the whole idea of balance.   Decide what resources you actually need to achieve work life balance and start seeking the help you need.

Flex your support seeking muscles by identifying what you need first of all. If you were in the front of the queue when they were handing out “Free Support”, what would you ask for?

If you have to pay for support (e.g. someone to do the ironing, someone to clean the house once a week), try viewing it as an essential “cost” of working. What’s an hour of your time worth? Given the choice, I’d rather spend that hour each week playing with my kids than racing around the house doing housework. If it comes down to choosing between doing without a lunch out each month to pay for a cleaner, I’ll choose the cleaner every time to give me the gift of real quality time with those I love.

2.   Are you listening to me, mum?
Have your kids ever asked you this? If so, it’s likely that you weren’t entirely present at that moment! Join the rest of the human race! However, it’s a wake-up call that reminds us to practise being in the present.

Don’t get hung up about the time you’re at work and instead focus on being present during the time when you are with your children.

We often find that our mind is in two, three or a dozen places at once.   Start focusing on what you are doing right now, rather than diluting your experience of life into past or future. Start taking notice of your present moment, because you’ll never have it again.

Shift your focus into the here and now – this is where peace, happiness and balance are found. Not easy, but worth practising again and again, especially if you want to savour the all too fleeting time with your children.

3.   Do a John Major (Get “back to basics”)
For those of you who don’t know.. John Major is a former British Prime Minister who created a catch phrase called “back to basics”. I’m not suggesting social reform here though, just a principle of simplifying your life.

Most of us seem to have a natural ability to over-complicate our lives, to make things more difficult than they need to be and to beat up on ourselves when we don’t reach our own impossibly high standards. Try the four “S” guide to simplifying your life:

Sort it (take an inventory of what it is)
Start it (pull your finger out and do it!)
Share it (delegate!)
S*d it (is it really that important? If not, chuck it!)

You can use the 4 S’s from everything in life to decluttering to decision making!

p.s – I was tempted to put a photo of John Major in here, but I thought the photo might be not quite in keeping with the my aim to "Inspire" you.

4. Fill that Ferrari

You wouldn’t expect a supercar to run without regular fuel top-ups and regular servicing, so why expect yourself to “run on empty”? And as a working mum, you certainly need to have the performance capabilities of a supercar! You must keep filling your tank. Is your water low? Are you in danger of over- heating? What’s your pressure-gauge telling you? I could get quite carried away with the supercar analogy, but hopefully you’re getting the picture!

Many of my clients are so used to putting themselves at the bottom of the pile, and come armed with all sorts of done-to-death beliefs about “selfishness”. How dare they meet their own needs?!

Once I’ve encouraged, cajoled or bullied them into taking time for themselves, be it a 10 minute walk to a weekend away, they always come back and say it’s improved the whole family’s balance and happiness as a unit. Replace the word “selfishness” with the phrase “positive selfishness”.

Put simply, you must identify your needs and get them met, or your needs will drive you. That means you won’t be able to fully enjoy all the many great things about your life in all the myriad of roles you play. Conversely, when you set up a regular system to get your own personal needs met, you will have more energy to be a great mum, more drive to be the best you can in your profession, and most importantly... more time for larking with life!

If you liked today’s article, please spread the word about the blog and talk to me by sharing your thoughts below! In the meantime, here’s to sunny days for all of us!

5 Reasons Why You Should Consider Being a Work at Home Mom

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 14:16:00 GMT

The time has never been better to consider bringing the office home! For working mums who struggle to find a balance between their work and family lives, many find the solution lies in setting out the welcome mat to their home offices. It’s not an easy decision, by any means, especially when the line between work and home life grows blurry. There’s also the initial cost of start-up, and the negotiation of new roles and new boundaries to consider. Yet, while drawbacks exist, the advantages of working from home may far outweigh the risks when you draw up a cost-benefit analysis! If being a work at home mum appeals to you, but you’re not sure how to make the transition, professional coaching can provide the guidance and support you need to set the changes in motion. In the meantime, here are the five reasons you should consider being a work at home mum:

1. Reduce stress. If you’re making the change from working outside the home, you’ll be pleased to discover how many stress factors fly out the window! By losing the commute, you’ll lower your fuel or transit costs, ditch dangerous road ragers, and gain an extra hour a day. Getting out of the office also means you’ll be escaping dreaded office politics and water cooler gossip. And, if you find you’re feeling a little tense at home, you can savour a bowl of your favourite fudge ice cream while checking email and no one will know the better! Best of all, as a work at home mum, you’ll know exactly where your kids are and what they’re doing. Sure, they may be underfoot when you least desire, but at least you’ll have peace of mind when you’re not worrying about checking references on babysitters or daycares.

2. Spend less, save more. Not only will you not have to worry about finding good care for your children, you’ll save on your monthly expenses! Working from home will save you money on everything from childcare to the daily commute, office lunches, and clothing. A quick web search will also point you in the direction of fabulous money-saving tips that really add up! Perking your own brew alone can save up to $3 a beverage. Working from home will let you make more and better decisions about how to allocate your hard-earned money.

3. Telecommute while feeding the baby. Perhaps the most enticing aspect of the work at home experience is the ability to set your own schedule. Even if you’re working for someone, you’ll have the flexibility of setting your own hours, environment, and agenda, giving you the freedom to better negotiate your responsibilities and aspirations. Having the leeway to determine your own pace and hours means you’ll have it easier when it comes to fitting exercise, appointments, or deliveries in to your day.

4. The time is right. With the rise of social networking sites, accessible laptops, and telecommunications software, it’s no longer necessary to work from the office. Changing technologies offer mums new opportunities to maintain at-distance contact with their employers or start up a home-based business. Mumpreneurs are quickly gaining currency in the business world while “E-lancers” contract out their services via online freelancing sites. With studies showing that work from home employment raises productivity, many companies are catching on and rolling out telecommuting policies that see the potential of an increased bottom line. Check with your company to make the switch!

5. Watch your kids grow. For busy working mums, the chance to spend more time with their partners and children is invaluable. Taking late meetings or traffic jams out of the daily equation means you’ll be able to enjoy the simple things with your family—dinners at the kitchen table or lunch hour trips to the playground. And with your home office set up, online coaching to help you become a work at home success is easy and accessible!

Why not consider giving yourself the home team advantage?

How to Juggle Work and Family Over the Long Summer School Holidays for Working Mums

Wed, 21 Jul 2010 21:23:00 GMT

For working parents and working mums, who tend to be the primary organisers, school holidays can represent a planning nightmare! You will have six weeks or more of time to fill for your children, well aware that this is quality family time, irreplaceable for family bonding purposes. You can't help but think how the months and years are flying by and how, before you know it, the children will be all grown up and on their way. In an ideal world, you would want to spend the entire summer holiday with the children as well, taking time to soak in the summer. Wouldn't it be nice if you could take a six-week holiday as well?!

But reality bites! If you are self-employed, you realise that holidays are few and far between anyway as you work to develop your business.

If you are employed, you understand that your boss cannot afford to be without you for the entire period of time either, but hopefully he or she is understanding and at least a little bit flexible, as this will make all the difference.

You have important decisions ahead and professional coaching can help you to unravel the answers.

You may need to juggle your parenting time between mum and dad and this is the time to see just how flexible your respective employers are. Some might suggest that mum takes her two weeks first and dad takes his when she gets back to work. While this might "cover" for four weeks, it is hardly an ideal situation. Younger kids will find this very confusing and, as online coaching will remind you, you really need to try and maintain that family fabric as much as possible.

Telecommuting is really taking hold and this might be the time to schedule a test run. If the boss will allow it, try and operate from home during the summer, at least part of the time, allowing you to be more flexible with your hours and more attentive to the kids. Plan in advance to show your supervisor how effective and efficient you can be, by trying this concept before the summer holidays come along.

As the kids get a little older, you will find that there are many holiday clubs on offer - a whole range from football to dance and drama. Plan as far in advance as you can as the best holiday clubs get snapped up relatively early.

Summer holidays might mean that you have to get really creative about how you fit in your work responsibilities, so you will have to plan carefully if you are going to make them as easy as possible. Seek professional coaching to help you with this planning, as there's no reason for you to be floundering around in the dark these days, with so many online coaching resources to help!

Ten Fabulous Days Out For Under a Tenner Over the Summer Holidays in the UK.

Thu, 15 Jul 2010 16:24:00 GMT

Summer is here and with it the call of the great outdoors. But the big economic downturn is still with us and family budgets are stretched. It is not easy to make ends meet, to pay the mortgage or rent and put food on the table, let alone find money to pay for those special summer trips. So here are 10 great days out for you to consider this summer, an eclectic collection, each for under a tenner.

Kids love models and grown-up kids do as well, so why not try Bekonskot Model Village in rural Buckinghamshire, where you can marvel at this "eccentric" recreation of a model Village, complete with mandatory model railway.

If you are a fan of Harry Potter, check out the location that inspired Hogwarts at Alnwick Castle. Children can interact and delve into the world of medieval knights and dragons.

Add a history lesson to your day out by exploring Hadrian's Wall, where you will find some of the best preserved forts and artefacts from the Roman era. Numerous locations for a visit can be found for less than a tenner by visiting

Who would've thought that pleasant, rural Norfolk would have been the location for monstrous dinosaurs? Kids are guaranteed to love Dinosaur Adventure Park, where they can find out about the days when monsters roamed the earth.

If you believe in Harry Potter, you have to believe in the legend of wizards and it is said that the caves at picturesque Alderley Edge were once a mystical hangout. There is something for all the family here though as well, at this national trust designated site.

Not so long ago, the Welsh relied on coal mining as one of their principal economic drivers. Those days are long gone, but at the Big Pit National Mining Museum, children can get excited about descending down an old mine shaft, dressing up as a miner and sampling the way of life.

When it comes to music, we all speak the same language and during the summer, BBC Proms Plus is staging a number of free events for families. Take this opportunity to educate the kids about "real" music!

Kids love trains and even though today's modern versions are not as evocative as the steam belching railway locomotives of old, just see how your kids are inspired when they see 100 or more of the old-timers at the National Railway Museum.

Walk down memory lane and bring the memories flooding back for you as well as giving the kids a glimpse of the past. Admission is free at the Museum of Childhood (East London).

It's not often that you can find things to do in London for free, but at the Tower of London, you can even take part in a treasure hunt on the beach!

Seven Ways To Find An Extra Hour Each Day For Busy Working Mums

Thu, 15 Jul 2010 13:31:00 GMT

We know that we have 24 hours in each day and that this should be plenty of time for us to complete everything that we have to do, with ample time to spare. The dawn of each day should bring a fresh outlook to all of us and we should feel rejuvenated and ready to tackle anything that life has in store. However, for one reason or another it seems that we are always playing catch-up, despite what we might feel are our best intentions. When the sun has set and the hours are winding down, we often feel frustrated, as we have not had enough time to complete all those tasks. As a busy working mum, we certainly know about time constraints and wish we could find an extra hour, each day, somehow. Well, maybe we can:

1. Set up your phone so that all calls are processed before they reach you. There are some great programs available these days, including Google Voice, which will help you to prioritise the calls that you really need to take, from the calls that can wait. You can even block unwanted or troublesome calls through the system. By having your own, personal secretary in this way, you will not waste valuable minutes.

2. Learn about outsourcing. While we know that it is difficult to find a good childminder and you might be taking on this task yourself when working or tele-commuting from home, understand that other chores can be outsourced, including daily cleaning work.

3. Get a good time management software program, learn how to use it and stick with it. It might seem a bit alien to you at first, but if you are really stringent, you will save a great deal of time each day by focusing your attention.

4. When it comes to planning, make sure that you do it! If you have a rather muddled list of things that you have to accomplish in your head, you will bounce back and forth between these chores and not be efficient. Allocate time to plan ahead, whether this takes place during the prior evening, or when you first wake up.

5. Allocate an hour for communication. This includes all those call-backs that you might have to make, the checking of e-mail, updating of Facebook or other social networks. You would be amazed how much time can be lost if you're constantly checking e-mails or taking phone calls without a structured plan.

6. When you’re planning your time, include a "buffer" at appropriate intervals. This means that you should not plan one task after another within an unrealistic time frame. If you allocate a certain amount of "buffer," you will not get sidetracked, harried or fall off your schedule.

7. Combine your exercise time with "catching up" time. If you allocate, as you should, a minimum of 30 minutes to 45 minutes a day for physical activity, combine this with your time to catch up on the news and current affairs. This could mean the installation of a television in your workout area, or this may now become the time to listen to a particular media channel or even to read updates through your electronic book reader.

Online life coaching experts know full well the value of time management and how adequate planning can help you to free up extra time that you might have overlooked. Professional coaching is not just for corporate executives, but it’s now widely available and recommended for people in all walks of life. Coaching for women is particularly recommended in your case!

The Emergency Overwhelm Plan for Working Mums on The Edge of Summer

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 14:40:00 GMT

Whoa There!
Do you ever feel yourself getting overwhelmed with everything that you juggle?

I felt myself slipping into overwhelm one morning last week with so many chores, tasks and projects on the go. If you ever want an example in how to make yourself crazy by running multiple projects, come and talk to me – I’m a past master at it!

One of my strengths is having fabulous ideas – I’m a natural "ideas hamster", and like so many women, a consummate multi-tasker. The problem with this is that our poor minds do their best to keep up, but they inevitably - and REGULARLY crash when we keep putting more and more on them. This is when we risk getting into overwhelm.

Are you in overwhelm? It's very common for working mums to slide into overwhelm, particularly at this time of year. If you have kids at school, you probably feel that there's so much to get finished and get organised before the long summer school holiday break.

Whether you have kids at school or not, August is often the time of year when many people take a long vacation. And we all know what pre-holiday pressure - tidying up loose ends at work, ensuring everything will run without us and the gargantuan task of packing our children’s paraphernalia before we go on holiday.

Let’s take your computer to exemplify what happens to your mind when you overload it. The more programmes you run on your computer simultaneously, the more likely it is to CRASH, no matter how many squigabytes of memory it has. I know this for a fact, as I test my laptop with this scenario daily.

This morning, I was fortunate enough to have a call scheduled with my own coach. Thirty minutes later, a change of perspective, a revised project list and I’m feeling in control again.

Want to know the process I went through with my coach? Here it is...

The Three Point Emergency Overwhelm Plan for Working Mums on the Edge of Summer:

1. STOP!
Stop what you're doing. You might think, "That's the last thing I need! I've no time to stop! Must keep going, must keep going...."

If you feel like you're racing against the fast train to Overwhelm Central, this is exactly the time you MUST stop and take time out.

It only needs to be 30 minutes, but you'll find that 30 minutes will bring you back into focus, help you re-prioritise and gain perspective on what's really important and what you're just fretting about because you've got into the habit of fretting!

2. MOVE!
Stretch, walk, take in some fresh air... simply GO ELSEWHERE.

You need to literally change your perspective. Go and hang upside down on climbing frame if that will help! But move from your current position and you will notice the difference. We become "stale" when we sit in the same position; our mind gets stiff as our body gets stiff.

And don’t forget to breathe. Breathing is good.

3. RE-PLAN
Spend your "STOP" 30 minutes wisely.

Now is the time to re-plan your priorities and be sensible about them, not crazy-control-freak-trying-to-be-superwoman.

Talking to your Coach is, in my experience both as a coach and as a coachee, the best way to do this (you know how to contact me if you want a coach who empathises with feeling like a hamster on a wheel!)

When my clients come to me in overwhelm, I look at all of their projects and challenge them on what they had convinced themselves was “simply MUST do now”.

Guess what? We ALWAYS find that many of their tasks and projects CAN be shifted, re-positioned, rationalised or simply dumped.

On my "overwhelm" morning I took my own medicine whilst working with my coach. Together we narrowed down my ten most important projects over the next three months.

Rules for your ten projects: These ten projects must include everything in your whole life. So, for example, here are my first three, non related projects that are major over the next 2 months:

Family
Holiday
Triathlon

These ten projects have been written up and split into roughly three projects per month over the next three months so I can see when one finishes and when I might have a little more time to devote to another.

For example, with the triathlon project, I’m devoting a lot of training time at the moment as it takes place in just over a week. Once it’s complete, the idea isn’t to replace it with yet another project, but to tick it off and put the emphasis on another project within the list of ten.

I’ve done a Gantt chart and printed it off to refer to in case I veer off the straight and narrow. This is my way of planning and managing, which means it doesn’t have to be yours! There are many ways to skin this particular cat and you probably already know what method of tracking projects works best for you.   It’s not the method that’s important; it’s what helps you feel that you have a workable and realistic plan to deal with it all.

So there you have it – The Three Point Emergency Overwhelm Plan for Working Mums on the Edge of Summer.

And here’s a 4th point – it’s called ENJOY!

Enjoy your holiday, enjoy the time with your family and enjoy your summer (or winter for those on t’other side of the Equator).

If this blog post has helped you, do please share the learning. You can post a comment on the blog or even retweet it! If you'd like this sent your inbox, click here to sign up for the Inspire newsletter.

I’m grateful for you spreading the word about Coaching Mums and I’m always delighted to hear from you and help you out with a gentle nudge or a kick up the bum, whichever works best for you!

Secrets To Selling Your Skills To An Employer As A Mum Returning To Work

Thu, 08 Jul 2010 07:18:00 GMT

With your new arrival now firmly ensconced within your household, it’s time to consider making the transition back to work. This has been a whirlwind few months and you could be forgiven for not thinking too long and hard about your career and your employer. However, you have to come down to earth with a bump in many respects and know that you have to make the transition very soon.

It is common for a woman in your position to feel uncertain, confused and a little intimidated. Now may be the time to consider professional coaching to help you approach this critical juncture in your life from a position of strength.

If you have decided that it is time for you to move on and find a new employer, possibly even a brand-new career, you will need to consolidate your position and build a powerful stance before you approach any new candidate companies. This is the time to fully understand your skill set and to begin calculating why an employer really cannot do without you on the team. Above all else, you have to be super confident in yourself and banish any of those nagging worries to the back of your mind.

Take a large, clean sheet of paper and write down all the skills that you possess. These will include all the skills that you learned while you were in school and in college, as well as any that you picked up in your previous position, or with a previous employer. Add to this list your undoubted skills as a planner and organiser, these vital abilities which you put into practice as you started your own family. Remember that, from an employer's perspective, skills do not always have to be accompanied by some kind of paper qualification, issued by an educational establishment or by some other organisation. In these days, when it is difficult to find good employees, an employer will be looking for dedication, self-assurance, self-confidence and an ability to be a self-starter.

If you do not have a tremendous amount of formal education, never be disheartened. Any employee willing to go the extra distance and over-deliver for the employer is worth her weight in gold, believe me. The would-be employer will see this in you and will be more than willing to add you to their team.

Online life coaching can help you to put everything in perspective and help you to draw out all of your abilities, expertise and capabilities. Very often, we are so caught up in our daily lives that we do not realise what we have to offer a would-be employer. Ladies face a particularly difficult challenge when it comes to balancing family life and their careers and coaching for women can specifically address these matters.

You need to be in a very strong position when you approach the employer, whether you are returning to the same company or have decided to spread your wings far and wide. Please sell yourself appropriately!

Seven Easy Ways to Nurture Your Relationship for Exhausted Working Mothers

Wed, 30 Jun 2010 16:15:00 GMT

The best environment for romance is a desert island, with no mobile phones, no emails, no work deadlines, no dirty nappies and NO KIDS! Children are sure-fire passion killers for most of us. As working mums, we tend to give our attention to he or she that shouts the loudest, and children are natural masters at shouting the loudest to get their needs met. This means that all other relationships get pushed to the bottom of the pile, especially the one with our romantic partner. However, it is so important to invest in your relationship and to keep the romance alive. After all, when the kids have grown up and have their own families, it’s just you and him. If you don’t nurture and pay attention to your relationship, it’s likely that you’ll find that you and the father of your children have become a strangers with no connection.

Here are some frightening statistics:

67% of marriages end in divorce
Half of all divorces occur in the first seven years
Living in an unhappy marriage will shorten your life by up to four years, and increase your chances of getting sick by as much as 35%.

Convinced? I’m sure you know this already, but the question I often get asked is: “How can you keep the romantic fires burning when you are simply knackered most of the time?!”

Here are seven tips that really don’t take much effort at all:

1. Look for the Good

As human beings, we tend to be very negative, always looking for the gaps or the faults.

Look for the good in each other. Make a game of this - every day tell each other three things that you really appreciate about each other. You might feel a bit silly first, but after a week or so of awkwardness, see what happens. You will find that you thank each other more easily and without it being part of an exercise. You will start to see the good points about your partner, even when you've just picked his socks up off the floor for the 3rd time that week. Trust me - it works.

2. Say Goodbye, Say Hello

It is so easy, especially when you have kids, to greet your partner with nothing but an instruction or a complaint. Make a point of kissing your partner goodbye, and greeting each other with a kiss again. Even better, make it a hug. Take two minutes to ask him/her what they will be doing today, and hold off from discussing domestic issues as soon as you greet each other during the evening. Instead, ask your partner what happened in their day – and listen. Remember that kids learn by observing their parents – you are their primary role models. What sort of relationship behaviours do you want to model? Things like saying hello and goodbye, touching each other and communicating are all behaviours and actions that will be observed by your children and you’ll also be helping them to feel secure that their parents’ relationship is a healthy one.

3. Indulge in Some Cyber-Flirting

Meet your partner on Facebook, Twitter or wherever and send him a private message telling him how you feel about him, that you miss him, what you’re going to do to him when the kids are in bed…! Write a poem or a love letter. Send a love text or send him a photo of yourself with a big kiss using your mobile. Technology offers us so many ways to communicate so use them to communicate with the most important man in your life! Disclaimer – DO make sure that you don’t use your company email etc to send risqué messages!

4. Schedule a Daytime Play Date

At the beginning of each holiday year, book a few “daytime dates” when you and your partner book a day off work in advance, but don’t cancel your usual childcare arrangements, so that you can spend the day together alone! Daytime dates are great as you spend time together when you’re not tired at the end of the day. Try using these dates to do something a bit different with your partner, or something you’ve never tried before. A few ideas – bowling, ice skating, go-carting, spending the day at a spa, hiking, visiting a museum, enjoying a delicious lunch…the possibilities are endless!

5. Look for your Partner's Touch Points

This tip comes from friends, who learnt this on a parenting course, and it really stuck with me. Your “touch points” are what you as an individual need, what you respond to, and what makes you feel appreciated and loved. For example, one of my “touch points” is Chris saying something like, “I’ll do the dinner tonight love - you take your time and catch up on your work.” For Chris, his touch points are more around me showing how much I love him, telling him he is loved and needed. What are your partner’s “touch points”? You probably know them, but you may not have given them much thought. We humans spend a lot of time thinking more about our own needs and wants. Take five minutes now and jot down what you think your partner’s “touch points” are, then go and ask them what they are…see if the two match! Once you’ve found out what these “touch points” are, actively make an effort to satisfy each other’s touch points once a day.

6. Switch the TV Off

If you tend towards “couch potato-ism” at the end of the day, as I certainly do, try scheduling just one or two weekday evenings per week to have a television detox. Now, light some candles, run a bath and go and soak, catch up...TALK to each other. Get an early night…!

7. Book a Weekly Date Night

I can almost hear the excuses coming now as to why you can’t book a weekly date night! Primarily, we cite lack of money, and of course, I acknowledge that this is an obstacle. But I’ll still challenge you on it, as I know that many parents will spend money on various activities for their children, whilst ignoring their own need for some adult time with their partner. Ponder on the following questions: If you KNEW that your marriage depended on creating this time, what would you do? In order to say “yes” to romance with your partner (and I’m assuming you do want this, as you’re reading this article), what will you say “no” to?

So, your task is this: Please, book a date night today. Do whatever you want, whether it’s going to the pictures or taking up a new hobby together.

Your ultimate goal is to make this date night weekly. If you need to start small - once monthly, then do so. It's preferable to get out of the house if you possibly can – the constant chores that surround us in our own homes can stop us from connecting romantically with your partner.

If you really can’t get out of the house, then set up your date night within the home. Light some candles, set the table, dress up and pretend you’re in a posh restaurant - even if the menu is beans on toast!

Go book that date night now...and have fun!

Five Quick Confidence Boosters For Mums Returning To Work After A Career Break

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 19:12:00 GMT

It's never easy taking a career break, but sometimes ‘you've just got to do, what you’ve got to do,’ as the saying goes. This is particularly appropriate when you have to make preparations for - and welcome into the World - a new arrival. Mum can be very focused indeed when it comes to the significant challenge of raising a child and it is understandable that her main focus may not, for the time being, be on her career, which will be on hiatus. Thankfully, our society is very understanding and mum is very rarely in a financial bind during these all-important days.

While some women put a great deal of effort into planning their entire working career around their life aspirations, planning in intricate detail what will happen from the moment they find out that they are expecting a child, all the way through a transition back to regular work, for most of us this is represents a process of discovery. It is, after all, very difficult to plan your entire career and personal life in advance, most especially given the financial and economic uncertainties that we have encountered in recent times. Such economic turmoil is enough to throw anyone's plans off track, but for the mother getting ready to return to work after her break, it can be a particularly stressful time.

Mum needs to be very confident when she returns to work after a career break, for a number of reasons:

First, she should remember that she was hired in the first place due to a combination of skills, ability, education and personality. This combination is not easy to find in a replacement, as the human resources department will be only too well aware. While not being overly promotional, she should shrewdly draw attention to these assets.

Second, remember that there is nothing to feel guilty about. Childbirth is a natural right for women in our society and the vast majority of employers recognise and accept their liabilities as a consequence of doing business. While it is true that a lengthy absence can be a little disruptive for the employer, this has to be taken in stride and there is no reason to feel guilty at all when returning to the fold.

Third, don't forget that you will have picked up some excellent managerial and planning techniques, as you moved through the process of childbirth and family planning. Don't underestimate these important skills and remember that you will be able to convert them for use within the work environment, as well.

Fourth, remember that, on average, 50% of the workforce is made up of women, a large proportion of whom fully sympathise with your position, as they have been in your position! You will have many a sympathetic ear, when you return.

Lastly, the fact that you now have a family to take care of is a marvellous achievement in its own right. You should feel justifiably proud of your achievement and if you can go through the process of childbirth, then you really are ready for anything you will face in the workplace!

If this really is too much for you, consider professional coaching as you work through it. Online life coaching is a truly valuable resource for our hectic daily lives, as in most cases, coaching for women returning from a career break can help to smooth over any potential difficulties you might envisage.

How to Get Rid of Your Fears

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 19:10:00 GMT

Yesterday I was reading an in-depth article about the nature of fear as related to the England football team after their first two less than stellar matches for the World Cup. The team has apparently been grappling with their fear.

I'm relieved to say that as I write this, they overcame their gremlins to beat Slovenia 1-0 yesterday, and they are through to the next round. By the time you read this on Monday, I'm hoping that they will also have beaten Germany on Saturday night!

But back to fear and emotion which keeps us from achieving our true potential. What are you afraid of and why? Mandy Evans, coach, writer and speaker has coached thousands of people to get rid of their fears and one of her recent emails really struck me. I thought you might like it too - and please especially take note about the point of "attending to your emotional well-being FIRST." A priority that working mums frequently need to have reinforced! With Mandy's permission, in this blog post, I'm reproducing her email, "How to Survive a Crisis, Even a Shipwreck."

High waves surged at the small fishing boat. The first one swamped it. The next one turned it over and dumped John Nevarez, his brother Elias, and their friend, Rebecca into the Atlantic Ocean.

For three days they clung to the upside down boat and a cooler with some water and Gatorade in it.

What important priorities did they put in place to survive? "Get rid of all fears," took first place. Next order of business? Tell blonde jokes, favorite lines from movies and share happy times with family.

On day three they were rescued, dehydrated, badly stung by jelly fish and in excellent spirits. With the stock market crashing like a big wave, oil spilling, Korea's threatening - well you've got the picture, sometimes it feels as if we are all afloat in heavy seas.

Will the Nevarez' approach work for you? Get rid of fears. But how? Here are the questions I ask myself and coaching clients that dredge up the limiting beliefs that hold fear in place:

What are you afraid of? Get really specific. When you deal with fear, the devil is in the details.

Why are you afraid of that (whatever your fear focuses on)? Of all the feelings your could have, why fear?

What are you concerned would happen if you were not afraid? When we are afraid, many times we are reluctant to feel better. Somehow it seems as if fear will help us and keep us safe. It does not. Awareness of danger helps but it that does not require fear.

Happiness helps.

When you face a challenge, even a great big one, instead of scrambling about to find a solution attend to your emotional well-being first.

That's what those capsized guys did. After they calmed down and cheered up, their creativity kicked in. They took turns tying one person to the top of the boat to rest, rationed that Gatorade and figured out how to survive to fish again.

On the third day a boat spotted them and called the Coast Guard.

May you survive every crisis, be happy and flourish!

With thanks to Mandy Evans, speaker, writer and coach and seminar leader for her kind permission to reproduce this on my blog.

Mandy has taught hundreds of thousands of people how to be happier and more creative by freeing themselves from limiting, self-defeating beliefs. Learn more about Mandy on her website and via her YouTube video: Why You Want Everything You Want.

What are your thoughts about getting rid of your fears?

Eleven Commandments for Mumpreneurs

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 00:12:00 GMT

As a mumpreneur you are pulled in a million different directions every day. Here are my 11 tips to help you make the most of the day and feel good about it!

1. Trust yourself
We all have the answers within ourselves – sometimes we just need to have someone ask us the right questions. If something isn’t working well for you in your business, then don’t feel that you have to stick to the rule book. You will no doubt hear many phrases from so-called experts/the bloke in the pub/your mother-in-law, etc. These experts will tell you what you must and must not do to create a successful business. Remember that you are doing your own thing here – sure, take on board the advice that fits well, but discard the bits that don’t feel right for you. Trust your instinct and all the resources you have within yourself; you can do anything you set your mind to.

“Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.” Dr. Benjamin Spock

2. Beyond the Brick
When you feel like you’re getting nowhere, when one of the kids gets sick the day of an important meeting, when a water pipe bursts and you are having a “bad hair day”, THINK BEYOND THE BRICK. Think of a martial arts expert trying to chop a brick in half – he does it by focusing on the air beyond the brick, not on the brick itself. What is beyond your brick? Write your vision; make it flowery, exuberant and fantabulous! Make it exactly what you want, how you want to live, who you want around you, what you want to achieve. Keep it in a special notebook and read it regularly and often. The more you do this, the more likely you are to succeed.

“If you can imagine it, you can achieve it. If you can dream it, you can become it”
William Arthur Ward

3. Create a Superstar Support Team
We can’t do anything alone. We are all linked by energy, by being human, by what we have in common. I didn’t write these tips alone – I needed my friends who gave feedback, my husband to proof read, the people from HP who manufactured my PC, the teachers who taught me to read and write, the people who made my desk, and so on ad infinitum.

You need support and just as you must give it, so must you receive. What support would you like and what creative ways can you think of receiving that support? Someone to celebrate with, someone whose brains you can pick, someone to help you look after the kids for a couple of hours whilst you make calls?

Think of 3-5 people you’d like in your superstar support team, decide what support you want from them and ask! You’d be amazed not only at how generous people will be, but how flattered they will be that you asked. Who did you meet on the workshop that you “clicked” with? Pick up the phone and talk to them! I will say it a thousand times – you need a community, especially when you run your own business. Self-employment will be very lonely if you don’t get a support team, and you won’t achieve as much either in terms of your bottom line or your work life balance without support around you.

4. Connect Connect Connect!
This commandment is related to, but different to tip 3. It’s about networking. I dislike the word networking, because it has suffered from “bad press”. It has negative connotations surrounding it – usually hungry, desperate businesspeople with eyes glazing over as they ask you about your business, eagerly seeking the person over your shoulder who is more “useful” to them. Horrible vision, isn’t it?

But networking doesn’t have to be like this. Ask the most accomplished networkers how they do it and they will tell you that they are interested in people. So go out and connect. Let go of the outcome of “must get business” because it just doesn’t happen like that. Instead, treat networking as an opportunity to get to know people, get away from your everyday work and give something back. My top tip for networking – try to make your objective for each event you attend to help one person in one small way.

”No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part
of the main.” John Donne

5. Make Time for You
You’ve heard this before and you’re going to hear it again! Imagine you are a fish tank. Where are the holes in that tank? What are you going to do to plug those holes and stop the tank leaking? You must make time for you. If you don’t believe you deserve it right now, then do it for your kids and do it for your business. You owe it to the gift of life to live your best life. You owe it to your kids to help them learn about the joy of all the wonderful things they can experience in life by seeing the example of their mum enjoying hers. You owe it to other women because as a mumpreneur, you are a role model.

6. Tell Guilt to Get Lost
I’ll assume that as a mother you have experienced some guilt, as it is my experience that an “extra strength” version of guilt is delivered soon after the placenta. My own (non-scientific) theory on guilt is that it was built into us way back when were less sophisticated social beings, to prevent us from abandoning our babies when the going got tough, or when an attractive passing caveman caught our eye! I believe that guilt is a sort of internal police force that our evolving brains developed to avert anarchy and motherless babies. Just as we don’t need our appendices any more, most mothers don’t really need guilt any more to keep us from abandoning our babies, but both appendix and guilt remain. So, take it that guilt is there, it just is. Now add a liberal seasoning of media indoctrination, with headlines telling us our kids are doomed whatever we do as mums and you have a potent mixture of nature and nurture in guilt that packs quite a punch.

My point on all the theorizing is this: We have guilt as mothers – accept it, live with it, don’t pay it too much attention. I often help clients with low self-belief by asking them to imagine that the little voice saying, “You can’t do this, you’re not good enough” is a little gremlin on their shoulder. You can use the same technique to deal with guilt. Name your guilt “gremlin” and picture him – mine is Harry Potter’s “Dobby” and has a silly little whining voice. I say to him; “Oh hi there Dobby, it’s you again. What did you say? I’m a dreadful mother? Yadda yadda, whatever…. Right, I’ve got to go now Dobby. I’m too busy to talk to you all day”. If nothing else, at least it will help you lighten up when guilt strikes. Just remember not to talk out loud to Miss Guilt in public!

”Don’t worry be happy” Bobby McFerrin

7. Have the Mind of a Man (oooh!)
Now this is controversial. Did you know that multi-tasking is actually bad for us? Seriously, studies have shown that it leads to Alzheimer’s or something equally as undesirable. We all know that men tend to focus on one thing at a time, whilst we women tend to juggle (and pride ourselves on this). I would never suggest that as mums we can eliminate some juggling in our lives – it comes with the territory. However, you will get more done, especially when you are working on your business, if you focus on one thing at once.

I had a boyfriend once who used to have a rule for his desk – only one piece of paper on it at a time. Once dealt with, off it went into the file or the bin. I have never achieved the dizzy heights of such structure and discipline, but I do know that by finishing one project before you start another makes you feel more in control, less mind-cluttered and gives you more of a sense of achievement. Learn from men and think “compartmentalise, think “separate drawers for separate issues."

8. Find your own time management
There are so many time management techniques, and the message here is that there is no magic “one size fits all” formula. Ask your friends, do some research. What has worked well for you in the past? Perhaps an element of it worked well – take that element and adapt it to suit you and your family. One that works for me most of the time is allocating things to do in my diary rather than on a “to do” list. That way I have to allocate the time and I can see if I’m being unrealistic in the amount of things I plan to do in the time available. Decide how much time during the day you are going to spend on your business. It is very easy to get caught up in our work and then end up losing the balance you were trying to achieve in the first place.

"The bad news is time flies. The good news is you're the pilot."
Michael Altshuler

9. Get Organised
What systems can you put in place to make running a business and a household a bit easier? For example, if you get stressed about not having a meal planned and you find yourself rushing to the shops for last minute ready meals for your family, sit down and do a rotating weekly meal planner – and shop with it. If you rush around first thing in the morning looking for something to wear, lay your clothes out the night before. And get the kids to do the same. All tried and tested tips that you already know, but sometimes a nudge to the obvious helps!

10. Outsource!
Outsourcing is IT jargon for paying someone else to do something! I know that mums often balk at paying someone else to do things we can do ourselves, but if you are thinking like a mumpreneur, you will need to look at how much your time is worth. If you will earn more by spending that hour by networking/making a sales call/updating a website etc, then is say £6 per hour too much to pay to get a cleaner? Is £20 too much to get someone to do the week’s ironing for you? Think about it in terms of outsourcing – IT companies outsource services to other companies, even if they have the capability within their own organisation. Why do you think this might be?!

11. Healthy Mind-Body-Business
As a mumpreneur, you are a lynch pin. Raising children and running a business is a marathon, not a sprint, and both need you to keep going. That means that you need to be fit and healthy, which means physical activity. Even one ten minute walk per day and five minutes meditation will benefit your mind, body and spirit, and make you a nicer person to be around!

If you are self-employed, then illness is something you want to avoid as your customers/clients won’t give you sick pay! It’s quite simple - If you’re happy and healthy, your family and your customers are more likely to be happy. More happiness, more profit, more success all round!

Maybe I should add a 12th tip, which would be to take action – start incorporating these tips into your life and see what a difference they can make! I love hearing from all of you and learning your tips, so do share below and just think, it would your first step to connecting!

Suffragettes, Sinatra and Pants: Your First Three Principles of Work Life Balance

Mon, 14 Jun 2010 19:39:00 GMT

What do the Suffragettes, Frank Sinatra and a pair of pants have in common? Together, they illustrate principles one, two and three of the seven principles of work life balance for working mums. I’ve put together seven of the most important principles for working mums who want to stay the course, retain their sanity…and still have time for a giggle at the end of the day!

As I know what it’s like trying to find the time to read anything longer than 500 words online in our time-pressed, information overloaded world, I’ve split the article into two, with principles one to three in this edition followed by four to seven in the next edition of Inspire.

Let’s start with the Suffragettes, Sinatra... and Pants!

1.) Be like a Suffragette when it comes to flexible working
No, I’m not suggesting you chain yourself outside 10 Downing Street, but I am suggesting that it’s time to stand up for yourself as a working mum when it comes to flexible working. Times they are a’ changin’ and retaining talented employees - both men and women - is becoming a key challenge for many organisations. That means they need to retain YOU!

If your employer is a dinosaur and you aren’t getting any joy with your request for flexible working, start educating yourself about your rights and start seeking another job with an employer that isn’t nearing extinction. Study after study shows that flexible working in its many guises can be a “win win” for all parties concerned if approached imaginatively and collaboratively.

It’s time for working parents (not just working mums) to stop apologising for existing and to start realising their worth. When negotiating with your employer, be reasonable, stay in integrity and be professional about seeking a work life solution with your employer. But whatever you do, don’t be a doormat. The time has come for confidence, courage and assertiveness when it comes to negotiating flexible working terms.

2. Do a Sinatra (“I’ll do it MY way”)
Let’s face it, as a parent, you are going to face silent or vocal criticism from someone who thinks you’re doing something the wrong way, so stop taking notice of what others say and “do” life your own way.

I read an article in the Mail Online last week that was a supportive, light hearted look at being a working mother. Unfortunately it was followed by a string of vitriolic and quite disturbing comments by readers who seemed to view the article as an opportunity to vent their strangely bitter and twisted spleen at working mums.

The sooner you learn to shrug your shoulders, raise an eyebrow and walk your own path when you come across such people, the easier your life will be as a working parent.

I teach my clients to “walk their own path” by helping them to identify their most important values and to use those values as a filter in every area of their lives.

When your life is lived in accordance with your values rather than what you fear other people might think, you will find it much easier to make choices that create better work life integration.

3. Say “PANTS!” to Perfection
Stop trying to be a Perfect Working Parent, as it is impossible. By expecting perfection from yourself, the implication is that you expect your kids to be perfect, and it doesn’t take a child psychologist to recognise that expecting your child to be perfect is not a good idea for raising well-adjusted and resilient human beings.

Besides this, trying to attain perfection is a great excuse not to achieve anything!

Instead of perfect, go for “Good Enough” in every area of your life. Think about where you are trying to be perfect (tip – ask your partner) and where you could lighten up.

There’s no such thing as perfect work life balance either. Work life balance is all about compromise and accepting you can’t do it all and have it all.

You can decide that there are some “set in stone” areas of your life where you simply will not compromise, but use the 80/20 rule here. Good enough will do 80% of the time!

Next week, we’ll be covering principles four to seven with the help of John Major, a Ferrari...and a desert island!

Until then, please share this blog post with your friends and let me know how you’re doing it your way, how you’re releasing your inner Emily Pankhurst, or how you’re saying “Pants! To Perfection.”