In their lifetimes, many women are tasked with making decisions about how their family lives and careers correlate, and the act of balancing work and family responsibilities is darn near a full-time job itself. Many women experience a slew of societal pressures and expectations that have been built around the “best time” to have kids, prioritizing work or family, biases surrounding commitment to their jobs, and assumptions about having children at all.
In a necessary effort, many companies are taking charge of reinventing how they support working mothers. In 2019, the American Association of University Women (AAUW) shared that 72.3% of mothers with children under the age of 18 were full-time employees. And, according to the same report, 23% of working parents say they’ve been treated as if they aren’t committed to their work because they have kids.
The numbers are compelling, and they address a concern for many mothers, moms-to-be, or hopeful parents in the workplace: How do you balance the perception of being a working mom with the dedication of being a parent?
I don’t claim to know the answer, but I did know a new mother at the firm who was open to speaking about her personal overlap between parenthood and the workplace. Several months ago, I sat down with Kathleen Halpaus, a senior project manager in our Prince George office, for a live discussion and, in addition to some key projects she is working on, we discussed her experiences of being a new mom with a full-time career.
Kathleen’s expertise is varied; she’s worked on residential subdivisions, industrial warehouses and manufacturing facilities, schools, and commercial projects. “It’s the variety that I love. I can work on a huge project and a two-acre project in the same day, but it never gets boring,” she said about her work.
A ‘jill of all trades,’ Kathleen has two decades of experience in the industry. One of Kathleen’s most intricate projects of late has been the Lutron expansion in Hanover County, a project for which she’s provided services that support the design of loading docks, parking lots, the building’s footprint, beautification, retention ponds, a plaza, and a central pavilion.
I can imagine that, similarly to her work as a civil engineer, being a mother offers Kathleen variety as well. From balancing daycare drop-offs and project site visits to scheduling client meetings and visits to the pediatrician, Kathleen is undoubtedly busy. Add quality time with a new baby to that… Shew! If it were me, I’d be writing a letter to see if the Earth could slow its rotation and create a few extra hours in the day.
Kathleen is in the process of adopting her son, Parker, on which she said is a ‘whole new adventure’ for her. “I mean, have you seen his smile? I’m in big trouble!” she chuckled.
“Undertaking the adoption process has been a lot for me,” Kathleen said. “It’s also a lot for everything that I’m connected with because it can be very unpredictable. I had concerns like, ‘When is the baby going to be born?’ and ‘When do I need to take maternity leave?’ And I’m just so thankful that I’m with a company that really is family first and can offer me the flexibility I needed as a new mom.”
Of course the overlap for Kathleen in her comment that ‘everything is connected’ is a truth for many parents. A career in civil engineering requires critical thinking skills, as does parenting. A plus for her experience, Kathleen said, is that her team has continued to support her throughout balancing her new motherhood journey with her existing workload.
“My engineering work is so exciting,” Kathleen told me, “and so is motherhood. In no way has Timmons Group ever made me choose. Not only can I have both and be really good at both, but it’s truly encouraged. We support each other like family.”
It’s possible that those questions have never crossed the minds of folks who haven’t known a working parent or aren’t one themselves, which makes conversations like ours even more important for understanding workplace equity.
Kathleen’s story is interesting, because along with navigating the traditional perception of new parents in the workplace, she is also navigating what it means to be an adoptive single mother, an experience that arguably comes with an additional set of challenges. Her team was invested in redistributing work while she was out of the office, offering encouragement, and learning how they could help her adjust with a new baby.
Kathleen also says she feels supported in her team’s recognition that she brings unique perspectives and valuable skills to her role at Timmons Group that she attributes to being a mom, like multitasking, empathy, patience, and problem-solving.
It’s not lost on us that what Kathleen is describing is not every woman’s experience at work. We also acknowledge that these changes don’t happen overnight and without intentional conversations surrounding workplace equity.
Ultimately, by understanding the needs of all our employees, we hope to continue creating environments that value and accommodate the diverse needs and experiences of our parent team members.
Interested in learning more about how Timmons Group supports our parent employees? Read more about our family-centric benefits here.
