| To the extent that was generally true... * most mothers were still with their infants and very young children. The babies weren't being taken care at a daycare where you can have one staffer trying to deal with 4 crying newborns. * mothers were doing active work, not work that requires sitting in one place, not work that requires long-term concentration, not work that requires being on someone else's schedule. I have noticed it is no problem doing active work like cooking or the dishes or grocery shopping while bringing along an infant. But I cannot do computer work -- baby goes crazy from lack of stimulation. Also, being on a schedule while trying to take care of a baby causes immense stress. What if you have a client meeting while baby is crying because he needs to be fed ... or is crying just due to lack of comfort and attention? Or sometimes (oftentimes) baby has a bad night and keeps you from sleeping, but you still need to be up and at work at a given time, instead of being able to nap when baby naps? Both parents doing a schedule-bound, desk job while raising a newborn baby is not how we evolved to do things, and it's always going to be a source of stress and problems, even if you have "high quality" daycare available. |
One of the nice things about being in charge of a remote company is that when I bring the baby to our weekly video call, no one says anything, and of course they all feel comfortable doing the same (although right now there are only fur babies).
If I need to take a nap because the baby kept me up all night, I can, as long as there is no meeting scheduled.
We try to do things as asynchronously as possible, mainly because being remote this is a better way to work, but the nice side effect is not a lot of scheduled meetings.
The hardest part honestly is saying no when my son asks, "Daddy, do you want to play trains with me?!"
But my point is, I think remote companies with family friendly policies will help a lot in this regard. There is still the issue of "I need to concentrate for two hours uninterrupted", but a lot of the other issues aren't so bad when people understand you have kids and they might come to a meeting and that you may not be available instantly.