If you’re single or a couple that don’t have children, it must be pretty frustrating to constantly read about fitting work/life balance around families.
Surely its just as important to achieve your own unique lifeblend too?
Maybe it’s presumed that you work a fantastic job then have an amazing social life that’s full of parties every night or go home to a super modern house with all mod cons and that’s your balance? I’m sure that’s not the case for most people.
A recent article in The Atlantic about not just families that wanted a good work/life balance, showed responses not only from men about “having it all” but also from singles and those without children. We tend to forget that these are also people that have to work long hours, miss out on special events or get stressed over workload.
Its been announced this week that the government are to update flexible working for parents from 2015, allowing women to return to work after 2 weeks with the remainder of their maternity period to be split between both parents. This is great news for parents, especially fathers who are currently restricted to 2 weeks paternity leave with unpaid leave allowed for antenatal classes. But…is this just another benefit assigned to parents over singles/non-parents?
Many feel they carry the weight of work that colleagues don’t complete when leaving to look after sick children, leaving early for the school run or even just during maternity/paternity pay and feel that “My personal life is simply considered less important than someone who has kids”
It’s important that we consider everyone at work, employees and colleagues alike. We all want a decent lifeblend, it’s everyone’s right to have a family but nobody should be penalized for not having one. Remember, diversity after all, is what makes a team interesting!
I’m sure there will be varied comments on this so please feel free to debate below.
I think there are some valid points in the above . I remember many a time when I wanted to book my holidays and just because I didn’t have children to consider according to some people my holidays were not as important even though I worked equally as hard for them and had earned the right to getting certain times of the year off. People choose to have children so shouldn’t play the victim when flexibility is not always an option to them .