Across The Life Cycle Blog

Here’s what we’ve learned so far:

(1) Men and Women Changing the Culture of Face Time …

On our October Thursday call three employees – two men and one woman – all for very different reasons described how they were able to work remotely. All of them also discussed how their work had improved because of their ability to work remotely. (To listen to the call click here.)

(2) Men and Women Redefining the Arc of a Successful Career …

On our January Thursday call we spoke with three male leaders who run organizations that support an integrated approach from entry level to executive level. Not only can these organizations attract and retain the best employees, click here to listen to the tape of the call to hear each leader discuss how this approach brings unique value to their clients.

(3) Men and Women Revaluing Family Values …

During our March Thursdays with ThirdPath calls we are exploring why men are as interested in rewriting the rules as women.

On Thursday 3/21 you can join us to hear two very different stories from two dads who redesigned their work so they could share in the care of their children.

This call is open to everyone, just click on the below link at 12:30pm on Thursday 3/21 to join us. (The call runs from 12:30 to 1:30pm ET.)

https://global.gotomeeting.com/join/482309717

YES! Let’s create a movement for change and truly become an innovation nation.

Let’s do this by having men and women – especially male and female leaders – model integrated career paths.

“Infants depend on their adult caregivers to meet their basic physical needs and to protect them from harm. Babies also rely on their caregivers for emotional warmth and the social and cognitive stimulation that promotes healthy brain development.”

“Although the responsibility for a baby’s care clearly rests primarily with parents, public policy has a role in ensuring that parents have real choices.”

Nearly 30 years ago, the authors wrote “current U.S. policy supports neither high- quality infant day care nor alternatives such as paid leaves for infant care.” Today, because of the number of employees not covered by the Family and Medical Leave Act, the absence of wage replacement, and the lack of quality standards for child care, that is still largely true.”

“Given the high cost of infant care and the difficulties in providing safe and healthy care, providing real alternatives, such as a partially paid leave for a portion of the first year of a baby’s life, looks like both a bargain and a wise investment.”

The book makes an excellent case for this important and critically needed change in public policy.

But what if we dreamed even bigger. What if we created integrated solutions, not just for the first year, but across our entire career-lifecycle?  When we asked the members of our Pioneering Leaders group what makes them most proud around their integrated career paths, here’s what they had to say:

Father of two children, ages 16 and 20. “Our ability to keep on adjusting. Everything’s changed from season to season. We’ve created a lot of teamwork as we just keep on adjusting to the latest change.”

Father of two children, ages 16 and 19. “We’ve both been able to have careers, but we’ve also been able to build in a lot of stability in our children’s lives. They are both deeply connected to the community where they grew up.”

Father of two children, ages 6 and 8. “I ask people, ‘Who is behind the door, who is the person you can turn to when you are having one of those horrible days with your children.’ My wife is that person for me.”

Father of two children, ages 34 and 36, and grandfather of two children, ages 7 and 5. “I like that we’ve created a strong network of care. My daughter is going to be traveling for a week, so this week I’ll be doing extra grandpa duty. We’ve created strong relationships with our children.”

Yes, any step to improve public policy in this country will be useful.

But maybe we can also harness the energy of progressive leaders – or the positive energy of the Dad 2.0 conference we just attended – to help us dream even bigger and create a nation that truly promotes an integrated approach to work and the care of our families from birth through elder care.

But what you might not have thought about … is how the different approach these leaders are modeling is also linked to managing a “reasonable” bottom line.

Instead of creating organizations that rely on extreme performance goals to succeed, these leaders are following a very different path.

Clearly we need thriving organizations in order to offer flexibility.  What these leaders also teach us is “enough is enough.” Instead of creating organizations that require excessive work hours in order to meet inflated bottom lines, they have created thriving organizations that support people to be successful at work AND successful in their lives outside of work.

Below is what Tony Doniger had to say on the topic.  He’s one of the leaders who joined the call. This is an excerpt from an article Tony wrote for the Boston Bar Journal, “A Different Measure of Success.” (March/April 2008)

A good deal has been written about contentment, stress, dissatisfaction and disillusion in the legal profession [and other professions as well, ThirdPath would argue!]. For better or for worse, many lawyers and most large and mid-size law firms often measure their success not on a happiness or contentment index but against a monetary standard. Earnings — or “profit per partner” — is the currency with which firms compete for rankings on the all important The American Lawyer charts.

To improve these monetary rankings firms do things that are harmful to the profession and bad for lawyers.

One way to increase profit per partner is to limit the number of partners who count in the equation. However, with fewer people making partner, it is of course harder for diversity milestones to be achieved as there are fewer openings in the partnership ranks for anyone. On the revenue side, the pursuit of ever increasing revenues by definition imposes greater pressures on associates (and all lawyers). The result, of course, is that lawyers have less time for professional and other non-billable activities.

In addition, mergers and acquisitions have increased markedly over the last decade. The cost of these transitional events is not insignificant. Indeed, at the annual Boston Bar Association Leadership Retreat, a large percentage of the attorneys present had personally experienced such an event, finding it stressful and resulting in a solution that was less optimal from the perspective of contentment, though perhaps more profitable.

In the end, we need to ask when enough is enough.

Should we be willing to trade some profit or growth in profit for greater satisfaction? Surely it is okay to make a little less next year (or not make more) and take on some new professional or pro bono activities, or yes, even personal activities (there’s nothing wrong with hiking the Appalachian Trail).

There is much we can do to improve our professional and personal lives, our pro bono and bar work, our efforts to improve access to justice, if only we would emphasize alternative measures of success.

This alternative approach isn’t just for professional workers … Read the excellent New York Times article, “How Costco Became the Anti-Walmart.”  It describes Jim Sinegal’s progressive approach at Costco Wholesale.

Want to learn more? Tune back next month and we’ll have the tape of the call posted on our website.

We talked about how it takes courage to stand up and tell the truth, but when we do this, it benefits everyone involved. You can see this in our story about CJ, a father who changed to a four day work week, and by doing so created a number of more effective processes at work.

Questions and Answers from Our Conversation with Peter Senge:

Question: Creating a vision requires stepping out of the madness and finding a moment for contemplation. Instead people get stuck in “fast forward” mode. What can people do?

More than time, what is needed is giving yourself permission to create the space to do this. It also helps to have others who are willing to think with you, and to encourage you to focus on what’s important as opposed to what’s secondary. In our over stimulated world we can begin to think we don’t have enough time. But actually we have the same 24 hours in a day, 7 days in a week and how ever many years we are going to live. That hasn’t changed a bit. What has changed is the mental model and the choices of how we spend our time. Once you realize this, you can make the necessary choices to create a different kind of space – a quiet space. It doesn’t matter if it’s running or yoga, just so long as it isn’t something “externally stimulating” like watching TV or surfing the web. There is nothing wrong with these activities. But in our over stimulated environments we never have enough time. What’s required is a shift in mindset.

Question: I get pulled into meaningless meetings. I negotiated a four day work week, but was told to keep it quiet. How do you live with this greater sense of meaning when faced with a work culture that is so different?

When you are trying to be sane in an insane environment, people will call you crazy. Your action is a contradiction to their assumptions. It’s not because they are bad people, they are just expressing the norms of the work culture, and they see you as contradicting these norms. You are also making them recognize that there is a choice. You are taking a stand for something that matters to you, and it probably matters to them as well, and your actions require them to face that they too have options. Do you want to take a stand for something that you really care about? One person might not be able to make a difference, but you can always take a stand for yourself. It’s also important to not do it out of anger. People will only hear the anger. You need to do it because you feel it’s the right thing to do. You need to be clear in your words and actions, “I’m not doing this to criticize you, I’m doing this because this it is what I need.”

Question: I’m supervising a team and doing the job of 3 persons. How can any of us try and work a 4 day work week when my boss’ answer will be to just get the 5 days of work done in 4?

A lot of organizations are expecting to do more and more without the necessary resources. I would just encourage you to ask your boss, “What do you think about this? It seems like we are trying to get too much done with the resources we have.” What you will be doing is engaging him or her in a process of inquiry. If you start with a simple assumption, that you and your boss have many common goals, it will help. I can guarantee that when you bring this issue up, your boss will feel just as stuck as you do. And if you can then find ways to engage a team of people to think about this issue, and do it by evoking curiosity, it’s amazing what can be done. I guarantee you, things won’t get worse.

Would you like help creating your own unique “third path” – an integrated approach to work and life?  Look at the “Get Help” section of our website – we’ve got lots of resources for you.