Reading 03: Question 2
By: Keith MacDonell - kmacdone
My snapshot assessment of the question "can men and women have it all?" would have been to say absolutely! But after thinking about it for a few seconds, I realized that I don't really think this is the case. For both parents to "have it all" seems almost impossible when intense, long-hour jobs are the norm. My family life has always been very blessed, and before stopping to assess it for a few minutes, I would have said that both my parents had it all. Looking back, however, this was not the case in the sense of having fulfilling jobs and raising a family.
Both my parents are medical doctors: my mom works as an emergency room doctor while my dad works as a gastroenterologist. When I was little, both my parents worked full time while an au pair took care of me and my brothers during the day. Both my parents would be home around dinner to eat with the family and hang out/do some activity after dinner. At this point, it would seem that my parents had it all. They were both able to work intense full-time jobs and spend time with their children during the evenings and the weekends. However, as we started to get older, around the time that I reached 1st grade, my parents decided that my mom would stop working at the hospital to be a stay at home mom. She did not get back to working part-time until I was in high school, when she starting working 1-2 days a week. I can say with a fair amount of certainty that my childhood would have been drastically different if both my parents had continued to work full time. My mom did a wonderful job stimulating my development in all areas, and I might be a very different person now if she hadn't decided to be a stay at home mom. The article "Why I Put My Wife's Career First" discusses how it is important to have one "lead parent" for when there are family emergencies or issues. I would agree with this, but this does not meet that one parent can't work. It does seem to mean that one parent has to have a less stressful, time-intensive job unless they want to leave raising their children to a nanny.
For me "having it all" means doing meaningful work at whatever job that I have and having a family that I can spend a lot of time with. However, if my future wife were to make more money than me at her job, I would not hesitate to be a stay at home dad if we decided that was the best course of action. For me, work will always be secondary to family. The mantra that I hope to be able to live by when I get a job is "work to live, not live to work." The best example I have of work-life balance would be that of my own family. Despite intensive jobs, my parents did/do an excellent job of spending quality time with the family.
I have definitely experienced burnout. During my gap-year between high-school and college, I worked two full time jobs during the winter when I lived out in Park City, Utah. This meant that for 5 days a week I was working from 8 in the morning until midnight. I would have to catch a bus at 6:45 in the morning to get to work. Even after just a few weeks, this style of living started to take its toll. Thankfully, I only had this experience for a few months, and I was able to blow off steam on my off days by going skiing and getting some extra sleep. However, that lifestyle would definitely not have been sustainable for a long time.
Companies can definitely help their employees find a work-life balance. Although I don't think a company is ethically obligated to do so, I think it is in the company's best interest to do so. As stated in the article "The Work-Family Imbalance," making sure employees have quality time with their family tends to improve their productivity at work. When I look for job opportunities, the emphasis on work-life balance will definitely be a factor.
The work-life balance is very important to me, and I plan to maintain it by getting a job with a company that places emphasis on the importance of this balance. I plan on avoiding burnout by spending quality time with my family and going on vacation at various points throughout the year.
My snapshot assessment of the question "can men and women have it all?" would have been to say absolutely! But after thinking about it for a few seconds, I realized that I don't really think this is the case. For both parents to "have it all" seems almost impossible when intense, long-hour jobs are the norm. My family life has always been very blessed, and before stopping to assess it for a few minutes, I would have said that both my parents had it all. Looking back, however, this was not the case in the sense of having fulfilling jobs and raising a family.
Both my parents are medical doctors: my mom works as an emergency room doctor while my dad works as a gastroenterologist. When I was little, both my parents worked full time while an au pair took care of me and my brothers during the day. Both my parents would be home around dinner to eat with the family and hang out/do some activity after dinner. At this point, it would seem that my parents had it all. They were both able to work intense full-time jobs and spend time with their children during the evenings and the weekends. However, as we started to get older, around the time that I reached 1st grade, my parents decided that my mom would stop working at the hospital to be a stay at home mom. She did not get back to working part-time until I was in high school, when she starting working 1-2 days a week. I can say with a fair amount of certainty that my childhood would have been drastically different if both my parents had continued to work full time. My mom did a wonderful job stimulating my development in all areas, and I might be a very different person now if she hadn't decided to be a stay at home mom. The article "Why I Put My Wife's Career First" discusses how it is important to have one "lead parent" for when there are family emergencies or issues. I would agree with this, but this does not meet that one parent can't work. It does seem to mean that one parent has to have a less stressful, time-intensive job unless they want to leave raising their children to a nanny.
For me "having it all" means doing meaningful work at whatever job that I have and having a family that I can spend a lot of time with. However, if my future wife were to make more money than me at her job, I would not hesitate to be a stay at home dad if we decided that was the best course of action. For me, work will always be secondary to family. The mantra that I hope to be able to live by when I get a job is "work to live, not live to work." The best example I have of work-life balance would be that of my own family. Despite intensive jobs, my parents did/do an excellent job of spending quality time with the family.
I have definitely experienced burnout. During my gap-year between high-school and college, I worked two full time jobs during the winter when I lived out in Park City, Utah. This meant that for 5 days a week I was working from 8 in the morning until midnight. I would have to catch a bus at 6:45 in the morning to get to work. Even after just a few weeks, this style of living started to take its toll. Thankfully, I only had this experience for a few months, and I was able to blow off steam on my off days by going skiing and getting some extra sleep. However, that lifestyle would definitely not have been sustainable for a long time.
Companies can definitely help their employees find a work-life balance. Although I don't think a company is ethically obligated to do so, I think it is in the company's best interest to do so. As stated in the article "The Work-Family Imbalance," making sure employees have quality time with their family tends to improve their productivity at work. When I look for job opportunities, the emphasis on work-life balance will definitely be a factor.
The work-life balance is very important to me, and I plan to maintain it by getting a job with a company that places emphasis on the importance of this balance. I plan on avoiding burnout by spending quality time with my family and going on vacation at various points throughout the year.
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