03.19.2024 Ryan Humphreys
As we approach the summer holidays, I’m already thinking about how we need to navigate the working day while simultaneously managing childcare. We both work from home and can be flexible.
Being Prepared
Although my children are initially excited for the holidays to begin, it didn’t take long for the dreaded “I’m bored” to rear its ugly head. Last summer, it took exactly one day before they wanted more entertainment.Luckily, we have already planned for this ahead of time. One parent takes the work calls, and the other looks after the children. Then we swap! As both of us work from home, we can manage the juggle between us.
Respecting Your Children
It could be easy to book my children into different activities to take up my working hours, but I don’t feel like that is fair. Not only can some of those activities be rather pricey, but this is my children’s summer too. They may also want some days where they do absolutely nothing and watch YouTube all day. That seems like a fair compromise to me!How Tribal Helps
I am lucky to work for a company that puts its employees first. I don’t need to sign on at a specific time and ignore my family for several hours. Instead, I can adjust my working day to suit my life better. This involves an earlier start during the school holidays so I can get some work done while the kids are still asleep or happy to do things independently. That early start also allows me to finish earlier, so the day isn’t over when I stop working. This helps me to still get that quality time in with my children.At the same time, I also save up a lot of my annual leave for the summer holidays, we also get a day off on our Birthday and Wellbeing Day in May, where I can use the time off to do something for myself.
Workplace Equality
One of the things I love about Tribal is how everyone has the flexibility to manage their day regardless of different traits or personal choices. For example, if I want to take my children somewhere, I can block out that time. Likewise, should a childfree colleague wish to allot time to go to the gym, they also have the freedom to do so. It doesn’t give people without children an unfair time advantage. Instead, employees are all treated equally.Tribal also recommends limiting calls on a Freedom Friday, allowing us to prep for the week ahead, and enabling us to catch up with tasks.
Final Thoughts
The summer holidays mean lots of time with my children around and working for Tribal gives me a great amount of flexibility to enjoy the summer without anyone feeling left out.
