Hellobee Boards

I work in a totally different industry, and def not as hectic as what you have on your plate! First of all I want to say that it's great that your co-workers are supportive! That makes me happy since we always hear about the lack of support for mothers in the work place!

Anyway, I checked my email a lot, and my boss would text me w/ questions and I'd call in occasionally to answer questions. I had tons of time for that; during that newborn stage, DD was always sleeping or marathon nursing so I was just sitting there on the couch ALL day.

I had 8 weeks of STD leave after that I worked 20 hrs per week at home and went back to the office FT at 13 weeks.

I actually loved doing it that way - it eased me back in and for those PT hours I could work when I wanted throughout the week.

I think this is just a situation where you're going to have to trust your other team members and let them take care of things. You can ask them to keep you up to date with maybe a weekly newsletter type email where you get a summary of what happened that week. You're lucky that you work with a team and can leave and know that there are people who can pick up the slack. Don't do what I did and spend much of your maternity leave working. It's not worth it and you will end up drained and run down because of it.

I also don't think it's fair to expect you to stay engaged while you're on leave. I took 4.5 months maternity leave, and my boss took on all of my work while I was gone. Unless you're backfilled by someone who doesn't have anything else going on, there are things that are going to be missed. A contract that I was expecting to be executed by the end of the year sat for the full length of my maternity leave. We're almost 2 months into the new year without a contract. It's frustrating, but it's going to happen.

The best you can do is prepare a full maternity plan while you're out. Assign tasks to the other engineers (if you're able to) and indicate exactly what needs to be completed on each project, what the milestones are, and who will take responsibility for them while you're out. Though I did that, my boss was incredibly overwhelmed and just didn't get to things. I picked them up as soon as I got back, but at least others know what your workload is and what needs to get done while you're out. Your performance cannot be reviewed for what dropped while you were on leave.

Can you legally work during leave?.....there are some implications to short term disability, I think (i know for me, they actually tried to make me turn in my laptop because it is illegal for me to work government contracts while on leave....)

I could have written this post, though with a smaller team. I started a new role as director of a grad program at 6mos pregnant, I've been on leave since 11/30, and will go back on Monday. We were trying to hire a backfill to expand the team before I went on leave, but it didn't happen.

What I ultimately decided to do, and has worked, is to have one main point person who was the funnel for all of my outside contacts. She was listed on my out-of-office and knew that she'd be the outward facing person for our team where I usually was. It's a stretch for her, as we do slightly different things, but it's really helped everyone know who to talk to when I've been out.

To the bigger question of how to make sure that she's able to do everything -- we're close, and she's talked to me a lot. I told her repeatedly (and meant it) that I had no problem with her reaching out to me as much as needed, I just didn't want to be available to everyone else too. We've probably talked for an hour or two every week, and I've still kept my email on my phone and checked it a few times a day. It's usually things from her (email if it's not urgent, call if it is) and I can help her keep the program running without devoting all my time to it.

It'd be nice if every job meant you could really take a full leave, but I really couldn't. I don't feel shortchanged at all on leave, it's just the reality of being in a leadership role.

@EBSC: Your advice is very constructive, but I think it's worth noting that while you were hired to be a director, temperancebrennan took over job responsibilities that weren't really hers to begin with! And her company had twice as long to backfill. I think that's why it really irks me. But, if you have to really have to accommodate such a situation, the "funnel person" makes a lot of sense.

So - I was (and am again) very much in your situation. My work is somewhat willing to turn a blind eye to some involvement.

With K - I had been very open with my boss that I intended to turn on my out of office reply but I was very open that I would be monitoring emails. Like you said - not because I felt like I had to but because 1) its just going to fall on me to fix it when I get back anyways and 2) I wanted to still be in the loop - I wasnt wanting to completely disconnect.

My bosses were both men - one completely understood me and one was a bit more "you should just disconnect"...I had a serious sit down with him and just explain that that is not who I am and not how I can function. They both accepted my request to continue to be cc'd on emails that were important (not just mundane day to day stuff) under the constraint that I would no "work" or feel I needed to "work" more than I wanted or could easily manage. The reality was that nursing I had 4-5 hours a day sitting and feeding her...so it was super easy to stay up on emails.

Every once in a while I was able to contribute or stay on top of things and put out a fire before it started. I was also able to keep them from spinning their wheels if it was a question I could answer. My boss who I dealt more directly with knew that by putting "IMPORTANT" or "READ" at the beginning of a subject line I would focus on that over others. It worked out well for us.

After 6w of leave I had lunch with my one boss and 2w later I had lunch with my direct report. For me - it was just nice to stay in the loop - it saved me from having more anxiety about coming back not knowing what I was coming back to.

I have started having similar discussions with my current boss (a woman this time with 2 kids herself). She said she is willing to work with me however makes me comfortable but of course wants me to know she fully respect my leave and doesnt want me to feel obligated to do anything.

@TemperanceBrennan: It's great you got a raise & recognition - that definitely helps to soften the blow! I'm glad the link resonated with you - I didn't mean to come across so salty, but I'm also struggling with the ever-moving target of "having it all." Wishing you all the best!

I'm in a similar boat (and on maternity leave now). I log onto email a few times a week (normally during my 6 am nursing session) and put out fires. I don't commit to doing work, but will do it if it will save me time down the road. My team knows they can text at any point and had clear instructions on what they should call me over.

I'm taking 6 weeks sick and then 12 weeks half time/ half vacation. There's no problem with me working on leave because I'm not taking FMLA. I'm technically not allowed to work for free, but there's no one checking.

I hopped online regularly with my first and stayed up to speed on what was going on. I mainly addressed any urgent issues and left most of the day to day stuff to my group. I think I dialed in for only 2-3 meetings in the 12 weeks I was out.

Since then though, my company has been acquired and the new policy requires access be revoked while on leave. I have a feeling it will be incredibly frustrating. There are some unique things taking place and I'd like to keep in touch with at least my direct reports. But, nope...they won't budge. Our open enrollment is also in a couple weeks and would be done online, so I'll have to do this offline with HR too. Such a pain...

I'm subscribing to this because I will be in a similar situation in August. I'm on a small team and there's no one to do my job. I had to go on bed rest for a few weeks in January and it was awful trying to work during that. But I was still being paid so I made it work. If I'm taking any sort of maternity leave where I won't get paid, then I'm absolutely not going to work at all. It seems like it will be hard for me to disconnect, but I'm sure once the baby comes I won't have trouble doing so. So no pay from work means no work from me.

ETA: I know I will probably have to work like mad leading up to the maternity leave and work like crazy after I come back, but if shit goes down while I'm away and not being paid, I'm not going to worry about it.