Episode 119: Tips for Fostering Work-Life Balance

Welcome to the Workplace, a podcast by Cal Chamber. I'm Erica Frank, Cal Chambers executive Vice president and General Counsel. And back on the podcast today is Jennifer Shah of the Shah Law Group. Welcome, Jen.

Hi, Erica. How are you today?

I'm great. And I'm really excited to talk about Mother's Day, since that is upon us this weekend. And what a feminine, fabulous topic to talk about today.

Absolutely.

And you know, I'm always impartial as a mom, and of course, I have a mother as well. It's always wonderful to talk about all of the wonderful things that mothers have done for us throughout our lives. And it's also just because of what we've gone through over this whole year and a half, almost year and a half. It's just a nice time to recognize not only what mothers have done for us, but also really talk about how the law has come a long way at protecting women in the workplace and allowing women to do the amazing things that they do, particularly through the pandemic.

That's absolutely right. Moms and dads alike, of course, have shared an incredible burden with the schools and churches and workplaces during this pandemic, trying to hold families together, trying to support children, trying to support the elderly. And this may be a traditional perspective, but a lot of statistics have shown that women do tend to be more active in those roles. Right. That's not to say men can't do a wonderful job. They certainly can. But for me, for example, I'm a single mom, and so all of that sort of falls on me. And I've definitely felt like this has been one of my hardest 12 months of work ever, because work has been really busy then. I've been trying to support my daughter at home, making sure she's getting what she needs. When she went back to school, they've only gone to school outside, so there's so much going on. And it's amazing because we actually have laws like the Family and Medical Leave act, and we got the family's first Coronavirus Response act, where we were able to say, look, if your school's closed, we get it. You might need some flexibility. So one of the things that I think all moms and dads next month can be grateful for is the fact that the law really has recognized that the workplace has to be flexible. And I think that's one of the gifts of the pandemic. There's not a lot good that's come out of this pandemic, and there's not as strong enough to word to say how Horrible it's been for the world and people in it. It's just been just horrendous. But one of the things I think we've seen is that people, many people can work at home in a very effective way. It helps them manage their family obligations. Rather than a mom trying to figure out, how am I going to drive to the office and do what I need to do, we're able to juggle a little bit. There are laws now for pregnant women, which I think a lot of us take for granted, which have not always been on the books. There's disability insurance in California, which many states do not have. So women who are disabled by pregnancy or childbirth get a wage replacement benefit that is not available everywhere. It really is a celebration, I think. Could we do better? Of course we could. There's so many things we can do about equality, pay and equal access and diversity, equity and inclusion and all the things that people are talking about. But it really is. It sort of took me back when I thought about this topic too. When folks put together the value of a mother, like what a mother does. How much would you pay the chauffeur and the cook and how much would you pay the housekeeper? And how much would you pay the travel advisor and the retirement advisor and the bill payer and. And you know, it comes up to some incredible sum of money. So taking a moment to recognize the moms out there, I think is a very positive and worthwhile endeavor.

Agreed. And one of the things that comes to mind as you were talking about the various hats that women in the workplace often wear, it takes you back to several years ago, before we had the iPhone. I mean, even before the BlackBerry and the BlackBerry. Oh my gosh. I was watching an old movie the other day and I thought, oh my Gosh, that's a BlackBerry. I missed my BlackBerry. But what really got me thinking is, you know, there was a time where women and men, but since the topic's Mother's Day would get up, get the children together, feed the kids, get them to school, go to work, leave work, pick up the kids to do homework, housework, and everything had to fit into this predetermined schedule that wasn't set by the parent. And then the BlackBerry, the iPhone, the laptops, the iPads, everything started to come into play. And it was such a blessing that the pandemic happened when we had all this technology because it allowed working moms, parents to be able to try and juggle, right, juggle the demands of both working mom, mom, wife, caretaker, now school teacher, Personal trainer, home chef, the list goes on and on of all of the different things that we all were doing of the last year and a half. But at the same time, I know that there's many articles out there that talk about how this made life even more difficult because now with technology and you can never turn it off, you used to be able to walk away from the office, but now the office walks away with you.

Well, that's the thing, Erica. So I was telling somebody the other day, when I was a brand new lawyer, I had to fly to New York all the time. And I loved it because I'd be on the flight for five or six hours. I would read a book, watch a movie, have some snacks. It was great. Well, now I can have an out of office greeting that says, I'm traveling and unavailable. I will still get a text or an email saying, jen, I know you're in the air. Respond. And it's not like I don't want to respond because I know they need something or they wouldn't be asking me to get back to them. But there's no way to be free, right? You don't. When I was a brand, brand new lawyer, I didn't even have voicemail. And I would go to the secretary at the front of the office and she would have little memos written on the little pink pads to Jen, call this person back. And then I could line them all up on my desk. But if I went home at the end of the day, I wasn't going to call them from my car. Now I can't get in the car without feeling like I better make a phone call, I better respond to somebody. So technology, in my mind, blessing and a curse.

Yep, I agree. And I think this brings us to a really good point of talking about balance. And, you know, as a working mother yourself, Jen, accomplished attorney, you know, you've certainly found what works and what doesn't work. And you know, of course our podcast is talk about labor and employment law. And, you know, we've talked a little bit about that. But part of, I think the work that employment lawyers do for their clients, and I know even HR professionals is, you know, sometimes be the voice of reason, you know, the voice of, well, wait a second here. Do we really need to be doing all of this? Is it okay? And we've seen articles written by, you know, about companies that say, we want you to turn everything off between 12 and 1. We want you to take that break. Do not reply. Nobody respond. It's kind of like a no Technology zone time? Yes. Do you have other tips that you could share with our listeners about other ways to try and manage that balance while still. You know, I always joke, my superwoman cape is at the dry cleaners right now. When can we just let the cape rest aside and not be on our backs?

Well, and I think it's very interesting because we have clients who tell employees, don't respond during the lunch hour, like you said. They also say don't send an email after 5 o' clock unless it's urgent. Never text anyone after hours, even if they're salaried exempt. It's not an issue of wage hour, it's an issue of culture. Right. And I have learned recently this great little tool on Microsoft where I can get messages queued up, but they won't be sent until a particular time. So I might be up at 3 o' clock in the morning working on something, but my messages are going to go out at the civilized hour of 9 o'. Clock. Not because I'm available at 9 o', clock, because I'm not. I'm back stacked with three sets of conference calls already, but those messages are going out. So I like to think of it as two layers of technology. There's the layer that says, okay, I can check a message, I can take a phone call. But then there's the layer of what tools does the technology provide? I've been on Outlook forever. I didn't know I could chew up a message to send later. So there are a lot of things that I think we just need to kind of think outside of the box on. Also, we have.

There are two clients we represent where they don't have any meetings on Friday. They basically say on Friday there's no meetings. You're not allowed to have a meeting, a conference call, nothing. It's a time to get caught up so you can go to your weekend without feeling overwhelmed. It's not your time to go online shopping. You're supposed to be doing work, but you're not setting aside time for, oh my gosh, I'm going to try to hurry up and get these calls done. I've started doing it and I found it is so helpful. I'm getting caught up on emails I didn't get to during the week, administrative work I didn't get to. If I have a doctor's appointment, I set it for Friday. So that, that way when I'm focused, I'm focused. So there are ways I think that technology can really help. And then I also still tell our secretaries I know you can look at your email on your phone. Don't do it. And I tell our lawyers, yes, I give you a data plan reimbursement, but I don't expect you. One of our lawyers used to work at a large firm and he went on vacation. And before he went on vacation, he told me, you know, I just. He told me several times, I just want to be clear with you that I'm going on vacation. Like, I was going to bother him on vacation, because I'm sure that's how it was. And I said, no, no, no, this isn't how it is here. Like, you go on vacation, I want you to go on vacation. And he came back and he was like, you didn't call me on vacation. I was like, no, did you need something from me? He's like, well, no, I just thought you would know, like, that's not going to happen. Now, did he have a bunch of emails queued up when he got back? Sure, because things daunted me to send. But there's this tone at the top that we have to have that it shouldn't be that we're expected to be everywhere for everyone doing everything. As human beings, we need a little downtime. We need a little moment. We have clients who are offering meditation during lunch in a quiet room. They're offering yoga. And I know people are like, what about workers? Compared to. All right, well, you know what? I don't think you should make a decision in the workplace about workers comp or unemployment. These are facts of life. So if someone gets hurt in a downward dog, we'll deal with it.

Right?

But the positive morale of we're doing yoga at lunchtime, it makes a huge difference.

Oh, Jen, you always crack me up. You are so right.

So, I mean, I think those are all great points. And what is wonderful about everything that you have said is it is not just limiting to those moms in the workplace. I mean, moms, dads, dogs, whoever it might be, this cuts across to everybody. And I know. I don't think. I know these are. A lot of these new ideas are a result of the pandemic and the fact that employees are now returning and recognizing there needs to be some more balance. Some of the things that they did at home to cope with the stress they'd like to be able to keep doing. And it's a really good way for employers to really take a moment to listen and help craft a new workplace. Because as we've talked about many times on this podcast throughout the last year and a half things are going to be different. They already are different. So this is just part of that movement. Well, Jen, thank you so much. Happy Mother's Day. Thank you.

You too, Erica.

And Happy Mother's Day to all of you out there who are listening. And like Jen said, don't worry, Father's Day will be right around the corner. We'll make sure that we acknowledge all those working fathers as well. But until then, thank you all for joining us on the workplace. Please comment, share and subscribe to Cal Chambers podcast by visiting calchamber.com.