Do people with kids work *harder*?

[ivana626]

@whitm11 I see similar but I also chalk it up to experience-I have two tweens and after log in after hours to finish or get ahead on my work…..because I have the life experience to understand the bigger picture more. However I do completely see your point and validity….the worst is I work in a male heavy fiend and they are promoted 10xs more than woman which is gross.

 

[silentbob634]

@whitm11 People with kids have more to loose if they lost the job and in general the ‘parent guilt’. Sad but true.

 

[jimishasmom]

@whitm11 I don’t work harder than anyone else I work with (including the people who report to me). I’m just efficient. What takes me 2 hours would probably take someone else 4+ hours. That’s due to my ability to hyperfocus and identify the urgent/important work vs just grunt work.

I’ve seen a few people comment on gen z lack of work ethic and I haven’t encountered that. Sure they don’t work extra hours (no one should unless it’s your own business or lives are actually at stake) but the people I work with (and report to me) get what they have to done in their working hours. If anything is left they at least communicate a delay and why they’re delayed.

 

[infomommax]

@whitm11 I’m the opposite. More than ever I do the bare minimum, act my wage (professional, but don’t worry about things beyond that), and you don’t catch me working over time except the rare days.

I frequently worked 50-70 hour weeks before kids.

 

[katrina2017]

@whitm11 I’m a nurse that works 12’s. I have kids about your kids’ ages. I do my best while I’m at work but that’s it. It would be the same whether I had children or not.

I think a lot of people (especially younger folks) are paying crazy high rents with student loans. They feel no matter how hard they work they will never get ahead. In my area a decent house is $700-900k and the average salary is about $75k a year. So they don’t give a f*ck and can’t say I don’t blame them.

 

[jenagirl]

@whitm11 I find for me, since having a child I’m just having to be always “on.” I don’t get to sleep in on the weekends as much, I don’t get to come home and just lay down on the couch and watch TV. Because of that I feel like my adrenaline kind of carries it into my work life too.

In 48 hours at the beginning of the week I worked 31 of them and commuted ~1 hour each way 3 times (6 hours of commute). A few years ago, I would’ve slept all day and been up all night after pulling that. But I’m taking my daughter to Bluey’s Big Play tonight with some friends so I can’t. It’ll help keep me on schedule so when I get home I can be asleep at an appropriate time and back to work feeling my full self again tomorrow. When I do slow down a little at home. Like take a nap while my daughter naps on the weekends. I find it slows me down regarding work too.

That being said, I don’t really see the same trend with my co-workers so who knows.

 

[tcmack]

@whitm11 I notice no difference. Lazy workers come from all walks of life. We have lazy workers with and without kids.

As a parent, I often look like I'm putting on extra hours, but it's simply because I'm knocking tasks out late at night that I couldn't get done because my kids had a doctor's appt, needed to be picked up early, etc. I'm not really putting in extra effort. It's the same, just at different times of the day.

Maybe your gen z workers have a lower workload due to position and maybe they just have better time management or easier schedules to work with than the people with kids.

 

[paparazi257]

@whitm11 No. Your personal experience is just that. We have people of all ages and with/out kids that work crazy hours and others who don’t.

 

[gigikaren]

@whitm11 Parents tend to be better at time management and juggling multiple priorities at once. I also think there is a trend with the younger generation now to “quiet quit” meaning work your scheduled hours and that’s it so that could be playing into it too.

 

[rylez98]

@whitm11 Hard worker here but I’ve always worked my 9-5. Any overtime is if I’m happy to do it (always short notice) and it’s being paid. I keep to my deadlines or explain if there’s going to be a delay.

If anyone (parent or not) is consistently working late then a manager will be asking what’s going on workload wise and offering time management, soft skills or IT training.

Sometimes it’s just a busy time, sometimes someone will say yes to every piece of work/give too short deadlines, or sometimes they aren’t using their time/programs/support staff effectively. And the occasional work martyr of course.

 

[longbeard]

@whitm11 I feel like I work much more efficiently because I am more organized than I did in my early to mid-20s. And with kids, I do need to do work at "off" hours (not 8 TO 5),, but I'm not sure if it's always working harder.

On the flip side, people with kids have more to lose if they lose their job: stability for family, potentially health insurance, harder to relocate when looking for a new job, etc. So it could be that we go above and beyond to make sure if they deadweight is cut, we aren't in that group.

 

[chrischan]

@whitm11 I wouldn’t say work ethic is tied to whether or not someone has children, BUT - since having kids I feel like I have something to prove. I’m constantly aware of how much work my childless counterparts are putting in, and I definitely feel the need to prove I’m putting in as much or more, and that being a mom doesn’t cause my contributions to be less.

 

[sshyam]

@whitm11 I think this is more of a maturity thing rather than a parental thing. If they’re not getting paid or it’s in their contracts to leave at a certain time, that’s understandable. However, if their jobs typically require longer than schedule work hours and that was communicated, that’s a whole different story.

 

[sofa24h]

@whitm11 Hardly. One of my colleagues who is childfree mentioned logging in over the weekend. I haven't done that in YEARS. If anything, parenthood has made me realize the importance of boundaries and getting shit done ASAP so I can have all of my off hours time dedicated to non-work stuff.

I no longer want in on the rat race. Feels like more of a race to the bottom. Everyone is expendable, there's no more company loyalty. So why am I going to kill myself over capitalism and lose out on precious family time in the process? No thanks.

 

[icantthinkofausername]

@whitm11 When I want to slack off, I remember I have three kids depending on my paycheck, so possibly? But I also always had a strong work ethic and would go above and beyond for promotions and job security.

 

[joint_praise]

@whitm11 Agree with everyone saying it’s more generational than parent status. I work with some very hardworking women who don’t have kids but they’re 30+. I’ve heard of interviews with some Gen Zs who were really put off by the idea of working the whole work day because they had other stuff they felt was a higher priority than doing the work they would be paid to do. They were not hired. We’ve also have some fantastic younger women who absolutely kill it and give it their all. They get promoted and earn raises and I adore them and career coach them. We have fewer women under 30 than when I started there 10 years ago since we’ve all aged and they’re all still as bad ass as when I joined.

 

[mrsgrass]

@whitm11 I see this with coaching too. I coached robotics and rarely had a SAHM involved (although had a few that were invaluable). I don’t think my kids have ever had a coach that didn’t work a FT job.

I will say, I don’t work after hours anymore, I did it for so many years in a high stress job when my kids were little, I’m burnt out and over it. But, I also changed careers and in sales now so I’m not involved with projects or deliverables anymore. I have to work every Sunday morning to submit forecast and entertain clients after hours and travel. So there are after hours, I just don’t log in online to work much anymore. If someone needs something from me, I absolutely will work whatever hours are needed.

 

[fredric777]

@whitm11 I work in big tech and the Moms on my team work waay harder than the non-parents. Yeah, we log off to do daycare pickup, dinner, bath/bed, but there’s no deadlines being missed or excuses made. The non parents may stay later in the office but there’s less actual work happening (based on results).

 

[annelay]

@fredric777 Yep, same.

 

[xpres]

@whitm11 I find that adults who are responsible for children understand the level of responsibility required and tend to be more reliable. It’s not about the number of hours but their general focus and attitude, they take things a bit more seriously usually.