The Parent-Worker

Tips for Balancing Remote Work and Parenting While the Family is at Home

Written By Ryan Hoover

Anyone with children knows that parenting is considered a full-time job. School registration, basketball practice, dentist appointments, and ensuring three healthy meals a day are just a fraction of the task’s parents are handling while raising their children.

During the school year, schools help take on a lot of this responsibility through inviting kids to healthy learning environments that teach, feed, and care for K-12 students. Because their children are looked after during the day, many parents work full-time jobs as well.

In a pre-coronavirus world, parents weren’t asked to be accountant’s and parents simultaneously, for the most part. While children were at school, parents could focus solely on their other job that helped support their family.

But oh, how the tides have turned. If you already thought balancing a work schedule with being a parent was tough, try having to do both at the same time! It turns out many parents will be asked to do so this fall when school districts across the country will have some extent of remote learning.

The Bozeman Daily Chronicle is here to tell you that while this may be a challenging time, balancing remote work and parenting from home can be done! Simply put, parents are superheroes. The new parent-worker environment that will be a norm for many parents this fall is the perfect opportunity to earn your cape. Forbes came out with a brief list on how parents can balance work and family at home when the coronavirus first began to close schools last spring in the article titled, 5 Tips to Balance Remote Working While Your Family Is Also at Home. You can find a summary of their tips below!

1. Plan Early & Together

Taking an hour or two at the start of every week to sit down with your family and discuss everyone’s schedule will help make the week go more smoothly. Find out when your children’s online learning times are and plan your own work schedule accordingly. Assess whether they will need help getting set up with a learning space and operating the computer to ensure their success in the remote classroom. If classes are scheduled at 9 A.M., maybe use early mornings to complete your projects that require more attention and concentration. Ask yourself the important questions. Do you have the time and space you need to focus on your work? Are you able to effectively answer emails while being “on call” for your children? Answering questions like these will help you construct the new environment at home and ensure its success. But, sitting down and communicating you and your family’s schedules will help get the entire family on the same page.

2. Be Transparent with Your Coworkers, Be Realistic with Yourself

Understand that your children are dealing with changes in their routines during these unprecedented times as well. Not having the social structure that school provides can be very discouraging for students. Many students that are now asked to sit at home and learn from their living rooms by themselves may be wondering what’s the point? With less opportunity for teachers to sit down 1-on1 with students, and no friends by their side, leaving your children to maneuver this new learning environment on their own is a big mistake.

Make their concerns and worries just

as much a priority as the ones stemming from your own job. Take them seriously. This may require larger portions of your time to be used helping them adapt to a new environment, and that’s okay. Take the time to do so and make them feel comfortable expressing their thoughts about it to you. You are a key player in helping guide your children to educational success from home.

The other side to taking on the role of at-home counselor is being transparent with your job and coworkers about this. Explain your situation at home to those you work with and make sure they know what your schedule is. Voice your commitment to the company, but also your commitment to ensuring a healthy environment at home. Being transparent with your coworkers about what you can and can’t do will stop them from making their own assumptions about what’s possible. If your children are going to need help at certain hours of the day, block time off for that and communicate it to your coworkers. Ask them to be understanding and that during these times a flexible schedule is a best-case-scenario.

Do your best not to overextend yourself in trying to do it all. Most jobs would rather have high performance on a fewer number of tasks than vice versa. If there are projects that may take slightly longer due to a few hours taken out of your day to help your children, accept this reality and voice this to those you work with.

3. Re-Prioritize

With the role of being a mother and father now added to your average workday, work-related and parent-related priorities begin to blend together. Make it your goal these next few months to successfully fulfill the essential requirements of your job so that the additional time and energy can go towards helping your children. This isn’t to say you should work less hard or slack on time-consuming projects, but simply to prioritize the essential projects first.

Most positions have tasks that are essential to the operation of the company, and some that are not. Ask yourself, given your new role as a parent-worker, what you can and can’t take on. Check in with your team and see if coworkers who don’t have families can help pick up some of the other projects. Follow up with them to ensure deadlines are met and the work is completed. Consider projects you took on before the pandemic and ask if they are still necessary. Provide others with the same flexibility in deadlines that you hope to receive for your own. Reprioritizing and communicating this with your coworkers will help you create a realistic schedule for yourself during these challenging times.

4. Self-Care Ensures Endurance

Taking care of your mind and body these next few months will give you the greatest advantage to making the new environment at home a successful and happy one. It is going to challenge you physically, mentally, emotionally, and preparation is your greatest ally. Focus on your needs and what has to happen to ensure a successful day for you.

Sleep should be at the top of every parents list. Make sure the family is getting to bed early and you are aiming for 8 hours of rest a night (infants may have something else to say about this). If late at night is your time to relax and binge your favorite Netflix series, consider skipping this for the time being and trying to get some extra sleep. A well-rested you is only going to benefit you and your family, and will leave you prepared to conquer tomorrow’s challenges at hand. A tired you will leave you grumpy and probably questioning why you didn’t get to bed earlier by the end of the next day.

In addition to sleep, some activity to take your mind off the chaos of the day may be beneficial as well. This could be physical exercise, yoga, playing boardgames with the family, and yes, even watching a few episodes of Criminal Minds. Block out time in your evening for one self-care activity that you enjoy. If you enjoy time alone to recharge your batteries, work out a schedule with your partner where each gets a certain night of the week for their self-care activity. Because we all know you both deserve it!

5. In Communication Lies the Key

Arguments are most commonly born from a lack of communication. From preparing three meals a day to conference calls to playing teachers assistant, your day is bound to be filled with constant action and movement. Please do not let this busyness drown out your thoughts and concerns. Use your down time to reflect on how things are going at home, what could be improved, and share these reflections with your family. Having a consistently open dialogue in the house will help get the entire team on the same page. A failure to do this could bring on unnecessary tension and passive aggressiveness.

Before the pandemic, your children had outlets at school to help deal with their thoughts and concerns. With a walk down the hall to the counselor’s office no longer possible, some of that responsibility has been transferred to you. Help them work through their academic struggles as a family; in unison. Make your children feel comfortable discussing their concerns at the dinner table by discussing your own. If communication is in place, opportunities to problem-solve together will lighten the load for the entire family