WHEN on Topic: Back to work after a caregiving break

Penelopi: Welcome to WHEN on Topic, I am Penelope Theodorakakou and I am with you again to discuss the professional and economic empowerment of women and the gender equality in the professional field -and sometimes in other fields too! This cycle of our podcast is dedicated to childcare responsibilities and their equal distribution, and is brought to you thanks to CAREdiZO. What is CAREdiZO? It’s a new project we’re taking part in under the CERV program of the European Commission, which aims to bridge the gender gap in caregiving responsibilities by promoting equality practices at home, in very small businesses, and in small civil society organizations (with up to 10 employees). The project supports family-friendly policies, encourages men to take part in childcare, and highlights the value of care in the wider society – exactly what we’ve been advocating for all along! The project’s activities include research, workshops, training programs, and the development of digital tools, such as educational games and podcasts, like the one you’re currently listening to, to fight stereotypes and promote equality. Our other partners come from Cyprus, Lithuania, and Bulgaria, and they are currently creating their own podcasts, which you might have the chance to get to know soon.

Today’s guest is Anastasia Moundele. She left Greece, lived in Brussels, became pregnant, came back to Greece and left the job market for about 10 years for childcare. But what she was met with when she wanted to join the job market again was not the support she was expecting, but the gap in her CV. We discuss the system that claims to appreciate the care duties, but punishes those who take them on. We also discuss what needs to finally change.

Penelopi: Good evening, Anastasia. We are grateful to have you here today.

Anastasia: Good evening, thank you very much for the invitation.

Penelopi: Thank you for accepting it. First of all, tell us a little bit about you, so that our listeners get to know you. Who you are, where you are from, where you are now. Whatever you would like our listeners to know.

Anastasia: Very well. As you said, I am Anastasia Moundele. I am from Kinshasa, capital of Congo. I grew up in Kallikrateia in Chalkidiki. I went to university in Thessaloniki and Brussels. I left the job market for 10 years. I have two children. And now I am back in the job market.

Penelopi: And we will talk about that later.

Anastasia: And we will talk about that later.

Penelopi: First, I want to focus on what happened when you first took on childcare responsibilities. What that means. As you told me earlier, you were in Brussels when you first became pregnant. A country that, us here in Greece, think of as an ideal place regarding the government’s benefits for its residents in terms of childcare. However, you became pregnant in Brussels but decided to come back to Greece. My question, now, is whether the decision to come back was a choice or a need.

Anastasia: It was both. On one hand, it was a choice, because I did not want to be by myself without my mother’s help. That is a standard extra help from someone. On the other hand, there was also a need, mostly psychological, to leave Brussels. When you first find out that you are pregnant in a foreign country, I personally, as Anastasia, did not consider the benefits this country could provide me with. I only thought of my mother. I thought she was the only person who could help me without any demands from either side. So I very clearly needed that help, without thinking of the new family member. I was mostly thinking about how I wanted to have my mother by my side during this new phase of my life.

Penelopi: Okay. And then you become pregnant again, as you told us earlier that you have two children. And how did this gap occur, actually gap is not the right word, if I may say so. This gap in your CV, sure, but also those years of your life outside the job market. How did this occur and how did you experience it in those years that you were off the job market, and was there a moment, months, years, when you felt like you were sort of losing your professional identity? If there was, maybe there was not.

Anastasia: When I had my children, I was not thinking about my professional or family identity, I was just thinking that I had birthed a child. And in my second childbirth, which followed very closely, they are only two years apart, I also did not think about it. Of course, my mother was backing me up and helping me with everything without me even realising it. When I woke up one day and decided to join the job market again, it was not because of a need to work. It was because I felt something was wrong within me. Yes, you have children. You go on thinking of this concept that “family equals wholeness”, but you suddenly realise that it does not work for you. Something else works for you. Having children, but also joining the job market. So it was mostly about making that move to expand myself and leave, while also leaving the village. Because I had both my children at a village. I birthed and raised them in a village. In a village that represented me.

Penelopi: You grew up there.

Anastasia: I had grown up there. My parents were there, my base was there, but it was not the village that I thought would cover everything for me. No, I did not think so.

Penelopi: Let me ask you a question. The village does not work for you, but neither does the phase you are currently in, as you said. Let me take one step back and ask. When you are first or second pregnancy came along, when you first had to take on childcare responsibilities. In what phase of your professional career did that find you? Where were you, what did you do or think that you wanted to do?

Anastasia: I was an intern in a big organisation, which was exactly where I wanted to work and what I wanted to do. It did not provide me with any financial comfort as a job, but I liked working like that in that environment.

Penelopi: So, you were planning your next professional steps.

Anastasia: Exactly! My professional steps. I had not made-up my mind about where I wanted to work. I was just wandering around. I have to admit, if someone asked me in that phase of my life where I wanted to work, when I had my children, I would tell him that I will take my children and come to work in that position. I did not see it as an…

Penelopi: Obstacle.

Anastasia: …obstacle. I felt very free to take my children and work anywhere.

Penelopi: I understand that childcare found you in a, not exactly critical professional phase of your life, because critical sounds a little, you know, emergent, but in a phase where you were completing an internship and starting to think about what you would like to do, in what environment you would like to work in. So childcare duties found you in a phase that is important, I’ll say, instead of critical, as you were taking your first steps. And at the same time, you are a woman, who also has immigrant origins. Three qualities that each of them alone…

Anastasia: Make it difficult.

Penelopi: Make it difficult, exactly. Being a woman, having immigrant origins, having childcare duties and looking for a job or planning the next steps. And you have all three. Is there one quality you felt made it harder for you than the others…

Anastasia: Yes. There is.

Penelopi: Easy, the…

Anastasia: Immigrant origins.

Penelopi: You spat it out.

Anastasia: Immigrant origins.

Penelopi: Yes, tell us about it.

Anastasia: Yes, I believe that…having or not having children does not cost you any position. The thing that, I think, costs you a lot of opportunities in the job market…

Penelopi: In Greece.

Anastasia: In Greece, we should clarify that. In Greece, of course. That thing is your immigrant profile. Absolutely. I do not have the same opportunities, no matter whether I can speak Greek very well, or have diplomas, or have parents who are Greek. The employer does not see that. He sees that only about white people.

Penelopi: I hear you loud and clear. But I am not sure I agree that having children is not an obstacle. You cannot make do with childcare duties, I will say.

Anastasia: Yes. In our case, however, because I have discussed this with many women. Another woman said, “Your problem is that I have three children”. They told her “No”. She was a computer sciences professor, who came from Uganda, went to France, completed her postgraduate studies, came back here, completed an internship at the Ugandan embassy, and entered the job market. And when she applied for a position, Human Resources told her “I do not mind you having children. I support women. The majority of my team is women with children. I even have support programs for women with children”. And the woman said, “Then what is your problem? I have the degrees, I know the language, I know three languages.”, and they never got back to her. And this company continues to accept workplace awards; I don’t even know what for. 

Penelopi: “Best workplace” and so on.

Anastasia: “Best work environment”, blah blah. Exactly.

Penelopi: Do you have other stories from your own experience, where a person, a woman, enters a work environment; The employer decides to be fair and, I do not know what other word to use, to not care if there is an immigrant origin, if there is a refugee background, anything, but he or she is troubled whether you will be able to handle the job with two children, whether you will be able to stay up late at the office, whether you will be able to travel for work. Is there anything similar, let’s say, in that nature that you have experienced or heard of?

Anastasia: Yes, there were employers who did not care about that, they did not care about the colour of my skin.

Penelopi: But they were troubled with the “children” thing.

Anastasia: They were very troubled when the word “child” was brought up. They were saying that, for instance, they might want to have a meeting at 3:00 PM. “Your child gets off school at 1:00 PM. How will you manage to be here?” But I will make it. Let me figure out a way to be at my job and do not worry about it. I will be here the hours you want me to, with the qualifications you require of me, even though I also have children.

Penelopi: I’ll say that what I can do, and that’s also the core of the CAREdiZO project, what I can do as an individual who has a small business, because we’re talking about small businesses, about small organizations, so that it doesn’t depend solely on you, that is, it’s not like saying “Leave it to me, hire me, and let me figure it out”. The main thing, and what we’re trying to do here, is that what as a society we call care, like, “The children are mine, I’ll take care of them, don’t worry, just hire me”, I, as someone with caregiving responsibilities, can experience it differently. I can experience it as pressure, I can experience it as a loss of opportunities, let’s say, so it’s more effective for everyone involved to say that, you know something, yes, I have the qualifications, I have the skills, but yes, if my shift ends at 3:00 pm and you schedule the meeting you want to have with the community, wherever we work, I won’t be able to make it at 3:00PM. Do you want to talk about what needs exist in the team so that this meeting… Because, if I can’t come since I have two kids and someone has to pick them up from school, and in my ecosystem, in my family, whether for better or worse, that person is me, let’s discuss why this meeting has to be held at 3:00 pm and not at 1:00 pm. We must not forget that. Or rather, we should not forget the employer’s responsibility in this, because if I can not attend this meeting at 3:00 pm, there probably will be other people, other mothers or people with care responsibilities, who will also not be able to attend. This is why I wonder if there is an employer’s responsibility, which is important to talk about, and there is also a system that probably wasn’t designed with all these things we’re discussing about in mind.

Anastasia: No, it was not. Generally, as a vocational education consultant, I think no company has designed a work program that would cover a mother’s needs. 

Penelopi: Okay, I would not say no company at all. 

Anastasia: I do not think so, not none, but they are very few and I think they are mostly companies whose bases are abroad. There are no Greek companies that adjust to a mother’s schedule. They suggest solutions like private school, playgrounds, or something like that. What solutions can we find?

Penelopi: Look, you know, before we talk about the solutions, I want to say that you’re a mother, I’m a mother, but the solutions that exist, because there are solutions out there, and the truth is that, yes, you’re right, most of the companies that have policies for people with caregiving responsibilities are, for the most part, big companies that have a directive, the resources to handle it from their hubs in Europe. But CAREdiZO is about what small organizations can do. Because we always think, you know, that this is something only big companies can do. Only they have the budget. And yes, maybe only the really big companies can, let’s say, give a good, effective daycare allowance. Or maybe only the big companies can give a childcare allowance, while I have to…the person who takes care of my child got sick, let’s say, and I have to step in. But certainly, not certainly, we know it too, and we do it too, there are things that don’t require a major source, whether financial or human, that I can, as a small company, think about how I can encourage the professional development and growth of employees with care responsibilities. And let’s discuss this from the perspective of a mother, because you are a mother and that is what you are here as today. So, what would you like to see more of in the job market, in small organizations, in small businesses?

Anastasia: First of all, I would like to see more women and mothers. I would like the employer to hire mothers, I will tell you about a plan I would have in my mind, as an employer in a small business. I would like to have two employees every day, where one would be a mother. She would work a shift that would cover both our needs. And then, if there were more things I wanted to get done in my company, I would have a second employee, who would not be a parent, or who would have older children. So, childcare is less time-consuming.

Penelopi: But isn’t there a risk of giving the harder projects, let’s say, to the person who I think has no care responsibilities, and the other person covering the typical 9-to-5 shift and doing more admin stuff with no big projects etc.?

Anastasia: No, no. You would take on big projects. They would both have the same responsibilities. They are just two different shifts. One shift would be covered by an employee with standard care duties, like a mother or a woman taking care of her parents. 

Penelopi: Meaning, the person with care responsibilities let’s say. 

Anastasia: Would be a priority. And then you would have some other people, who would want some of their needs covered as well, while also covering the office’s needs, the admin, whatever it is called. They will both do the same job. You can also use a program, which I have recommended to a company, I suggested they employ mothers who want to spend their afternoons working on something. There are mothers who take care of their babies until 2:00 pm-3:00 pm, but when the father comes home, they want to go out. They want to go to the market, they want to go to the company. Then the ball is passed over to the employer’s court. I think we are all open to providing this. 

Penelopi: What would you say that small organisations or small companies can do to promote the equal share of childcare responsibilities among fathers too, because we have been talking so long about fathers.

Anastasia: Of course, fathers as well. 

Penelopi: But, as an employer, what can I do if I have fathers on my team? Men with care duties could be taking care of sick parents, sick relatives, anyone. This flexibility, the time schedule etc., is not just about helping out mothers work less. 

Anastasia: They also help out the father. 

Penelopi: And to help out the father, so that the mother can work as much as she wants to and needs to, can evolve, can travel, can take on big projects and not have anything hold her back. What can companies do to shift some of that weight of responsibility on the fathers?

Anastasia: Childcare is not a woman’s responsibility exclusively. It is men’s too. Basically, this is what we need to discard. Start from there.

Penelopi: From the stereotype.

Anastasia: The stereotype that responsibility and care, any sort of care, is female. This does not exist. Also, male employers must realise that you cannot treat a woman who has children differently from a man who has children. You cannot say to the man “It is fine, you are now off work, go, have a six-hour shift, I understand, it is not your job taking care of the children, go on, go home. Because this happens. The same schedule you give a man, the same you will also give to a woman.

Penelopi: To see if I understand your example, you are saying this in the sense that a man could say “My child is sick, I have to leave work abruptly”. And the employer would say “Yes, yes, yes, of course”.

Anastasia: Absolutely, yes.

Penelopi: Because he does not ask for it often.

Anastasia: Yes, he does not ask for that often. But if you say it, as a woman, he would say “Well she is off again. You are all excuses. It’s a free-for-all.” Also, we women have our personal care responsibility, our menstrual cycles, that no one sees. There, you are invisible.

Penelopi: What would you say to any employers listening, and the public too, and what do you perhaps already say? Because I say that the baseline of our discussion today, and what we have been discussing in many of these cycle’s episodes, is that the stereotype that childcare is a woman’s duty, that “You women are better at this” and so on, is a stereotype that needs to be dealt with and diminished. What would be…

Anastasia: To learn. If you do not know, then learn. My mother took care of me just like yours took care of you. The knowledge she provided me with, yours provided you with too. This is called learning. If you want to, you do it. They do not want to learn. They think it is their right to not learn. I am raising boys, I know of this.

Penelopi: That is what I am saying, that if we move from “I do not want to learn” to…

Anastasia: “You must learn”.

Penelopi: But how will we do that?

Anastasia: There must be training. There should be skill trainings for men, there should be training for men. We must teach men that the same thing your boss will say to you for being late to work…

Penelopi: The same he will say to me too.

Anastasia: The same he will say to me too. We also need to teach men that it doesn’t financially change whether you are away from home. The same amount of time you are away from home because we have a child, I will be away too. So, whatever you get paid, I will get paid as well. Whatever benefits your employer gives you, he will give me too. So where do you see the inequality in that? Why don’t you let me go out today, work this week, and you stay at home to take care of the child? And there he comes, a male, and he tells you, “I can’t take care of the child, I don’t know where the thermometer is, I don’t know where the glass is, I don’t know where the towel is, I will call my mother”. And there you say, no pal, you will not call your mother. That’s where training comes in.

Penelopi: Alright, this is the education from within the house, within the family, but there need to be educational seminars from companies to secure the same opportunities.

Anastasia: The companies, the companies. Our corporate should stop being so mythical, and instead start being more active, more practical.

Penelopi: You, Anastasia, are currently on a new professional path. Would you like to tell us a little bit about it?

Anastasia: Yes. I am a vocational education consultant. I deal with the naval aspect. Basically, I handle crew staffing on ships. So, most of my clients are men.

Penelopi: And now that you are building this new business, let’s say, this new professional step, and you have the chance to set the rules yourself, how do you plan to make the culture of care present in your services and possibly even in a… Because okay, right now you’re solo, but hopefully, in the near future, you will not be solo, and you will have a team helping you with staffing and everything you are doing. What will you do differently from what you have experienced as an employer yourself, I hope?

Anastasia: First, I would like my team to consist of more women and women who are also mothers. To test this flexible schedule, to see how it works, because I am like that too. So, I want, through my team, which will have more women and mothers, to find out if this flexible schedule helps them, if it’s a plus or a minus for them.

Penelopi: Okay, to test out some policies that you might actually benefit from, too.

Anastasia: Yes, yes, yes! Exactly.

Penelopi: We wish you good luck in building this inclusive…

Anastasia: Thank you so so much.

Penelopi: Multicultural and safe work environment.

Anastasia: Yes, we want it to be safe, to be multicultural, as you said, immigrant and very active.

Penelopi: Perfect.

Anastasia: I want there to be a kind of plurality. If we could have many skin colours in our office, that would be amazing. Many voices, actually.

Penelopi: Excellent.

Anastasia: Many voices, yes.

Penelopi: Thank you very very much. 

Penelopi: What did you think of everything we discussed today with Anastasia? What else do you think CAREdiZO could create that would bring us one step closer to equality inside and outside of the office? We are here to read and listen to your suggestions, your comments and your ideas. Follow us on social media, e-mail us, leave your review on Spotify, come visit us at WHEN Hub and let’s continue our discussion in order to make WHEN and CAREdiZO even better for everyone.