Full transcript Ladies Wellness Event August 2019

LG: Sara, thanks for being here! Being a local girl, I am sure many people know you, but for those who don't, can you tell us a little about yourself?

SS: Thanks Linda for having me here. It’s great to have such a lovely event here in our hometown, and what a great crowd we have. Yes, I do know quite a few people here and I am probably related to half of the town, but for the other 50%: I am Sara Slattery, I was born and raised here in Dunmore, but spent the last 17 years living in Dublin. Last summer I moved back here with my husband and three children, and it’s been great. I now run my own business as a Career & Life Coach for women here in the West, in Dublin and online for everywhere else.

LG: So how did you become a life coach? What led you here?

SS: I suppose this hasn’t been a huge career change for me. My background in college was sociology, and then I did a master’s in Community Development. I  worked in Ballymun in North Dublin for quite a few years on various projects relating to early school leavers and young people who were transitioning out of prison. I worked with developing education & training plans for my clients, as well as assistance for many social supports that they needed. I then moved to the Tusla the Child and Family agency, where I worked for 10 years helping families whose children were experiencing challenges in the education system. 

I got really burnt out by this work, and after my third child was born I didn’t return. It was difficult in one way to let go of the permanent pensionable job, but it was also an easy decision in the sense that I knew I couldn’t do it anymore. So I retrained as a Life Coach and set up my own business. I really see it as the same work I have been doing for the past 20 years, which is helping people navigate from A to B in life and work. The client group is different now, but the work is the same really.

LG: Who are the types of people that come to you for coaching?

SS: Anybody can benefit from coaching, regardless of your gender, your age, or your stage in career. You also don’t have to be at a major crossroads to benefit from it. But like most of us, we often wait until things are tricky before we seek help! There are loads of coaches out there and it’s important to find the right one for you. The people who come to me tend to be all women and broadly fall into three categories:

-Women who have had their children in recent years and are trying to juggle and manage the whole work/home piece. They are finding it all too much and unsustainable and are seeking to find another way to live

-The second group are women who have generally been doing the same or similar job or career for the past 20 years and feel like they are stuck in a rut and are wondering what it’s all about. They are looking for a new career change

-And the final group don’t really know why they are contacting me, they just feel that something is off and are wondering what it is all about. They want to explore why they are feeling like this and if there are changes they can make to their lives.

LG: So, work-life balance: what’s the magic formula? Is there such thing? 

SS: It really is THE question Linda, isn’t it? And of course I have all the answers here and am going to trademark the formula and sell it worldwide! Joking of course, but it’s such a huge topic and we could go down many roads with it. It is so complicated. But for this evening's 15-minute conversation, I’d like to highlight 3 points, which hopefully you could consider and think a little differently about when leaving this evening.

The first is to consider that balance is completely subjective, and what is a balanced life for me could be the complete opposite to you. Some people could consider my life to be totally boring, at home all day, and I may look at others wondering how they do all those hours and travelling, but it may be exciting and really work for them.

We need to stop looking externally and look at ourselves and define what is success for us, not what society tells us, not what our siblings do, what our parents think of or what the parents of our children's classmates do. Figure out what’s important to you, your values, and from that, define what is success for you and your family, and then balance can become clearer.

We go off piste following a success journey that is not even ours to begin with. Work-life balance is unique to you, your family situation, and it’s up to you to decide what that is. 

LG: The sounds good Sara. I know when we spoke before, you mentioned the concepts of the second shift and the mental load, and I was blown away by these. Could you say some more here?

SS: Yes, so the second shift is a concept that sociologists have put forward as one of the reasons why women don't progress to leadership positions in the workplace as much as their male colleagues. And the reason is that when many women clock off from their paid job, a second shift of work begins, which is the majority of caregiving, the housecleaning and generally running of the family. And caregiving can be related to elderly parents or a sibling with additional needs, not just children. Even in this day and age, women are doing most of this unpaid and undervalued work.

The mental load then is a related concept. And it’s the reality that the majority of women, and particularly mothers, carry a million to-do list in their heads every day, all to do with the running of the family and the home. Remembering the children's vaccine schedule, knowing when the next set of clothes come out of the press, thinking ahead for Christmas, remember birthday presents and cards for kids’ friends and also for the inlaws. They all sound trivial and not a problem individually, but when there are 100s running through our heads we become essentially the project managers of our home. Say for example your child gets sick, mother first notices that the child is sick, googles the symptoms, searches in a Facebook parenting group they are on, post on a Facebook parenting group, researches the best remedy for said ailment, makes the decision that a doctor’s appointment is necessary, makes appointment. Partner brings child to doctor. Apparently the execution of a task is only 25% of the actual work, and who does the other 75%?? We have to begin to notice these patterns and let go of the idea that ‘I am better at this stuff’, and divide out responsibilities and ensure that you are not carrying all of this. Of course if you are a single parent, then you are carrying all of this and need a huge amount of support.

The reason why the second shift and the mental load are important is because they are some of the contributaries to why women don't move into leadership positions. They weigh up their level of responsibility at home and at work and make a very rational decision that it’s not worth it. So until we have equality in the home, we won’t have equality in the workplace.

The third point relates to creating and maintaining boundaries. The line between work and home is becoming evermore blurred, which can be great in one way with working from home options, company phones, etc., but at what cost? Is there an expectation that you are to be more accessible with email and calls way outside of your paid working hours? Many of us have experience of taking one day a week parental leave, but then cramming 5 days’ work into it despite only getting paid for 4. That’s a complete infringement of your work-life balance and needs to be addressed. It can be difficult to challenge the workplace culture, but small changes can be made. For example, if the culture in your office is to stay until 6pm even though your contract states that 5pm is your finish time, consider leaving at 5.55pm in the beginning and see how it feels - small steps.

Being self employed, your boundaries need to be impeccable. Just because someone sends you a DM at 10pm, you do not need to respond. Set your hours for responding to clients and try as best you can to stick to it. Our phones do not need to control us - switch off notifications and relax.

If you are a stay-at-home mother, you also need to watch your boundaries. It can often be the case that household jobs are left to you because it is ‘easier’, like bringing the car for a service or picking up birthday presents. In my experience, these jobs are much easier to do during breaks in the paid work environment when you don't have 3 kids hanging off you.  

If you don’t have children and you are being asked to babysit for a niece or nephew a little more often than you would like, you don't need to say yes. If you are the person asked to stay late at work all the time because you don't have children, say no occasionally and you don't need to provide an explanation.

As a woman, your time and energy are your currency. There is so much unrealised potential in the room because we are so dog-bone tired. We need to reclaim our time and energy so we can be the people we are supposed to be.

LG: How can coaching help with these areas/issues?

SS: The main way it helps is by giving us the space and time to consider things in our lives that we just don’t have time to in day-to-day life. We are always rushing and racing, and the small moments we do have, we have our heads stuck in a phone. And I personally do not have all these issues sorted; it’s very much a work in progress for me too, 2 steps forward and 1 back!

If you are interested in coaching, whether that's with me or anyone else, you need to feel comfortable with them and that's why I offer a free 30-minute call before any booking to ensure we are right for each other. If you decide to book, we start with 3 sessions and we work on getting clarity on your values, your vision, who you want to be, what are your blocks in making change. I also want to reassure anyone that may be interested that it is a completely confidential service. I am not going to bump into you in the local Eurospar and start talking about what we discussed in our last session. Similarly, I don't mention anything about my work to my family other than ‘business is going well’ and that’s it.

LG: So it’s practical then?

SS: Absolutely. While we work through the higher-level stuff of vision and values, we then bring it right back down to develop a plan with small steps that feels right for you and is practical. I’m not one of those coaches who says jump and the universe will provide. We all have mortgages to pay and change needs to be realistic and practical. Coaching also brings a feeling of accountability to what you say you want to do: having someone to meet every few weeks will make it far more likely that you will make the changes.

LG: Sounds great Sara, so how can people contact you?

SS: I’ll be around during the interval and after the event, or you can contact me through my website www.spacebetween.ie and we can schedule a chat. Thanks for having me!