The Truth Behind A Working Mom’s Resume
I have been thinking a lot about the balance of my career and being a mother. In other words, I am still struggling to balance the two. I have come to the conclusion that I cannot permanently solve this issue of balance, but rather attack it every day and set new priorities everyday – generally based on who is screaming the loudest.
What has helped me with my daily prioritization is having one über focus. I have decided that I am a mom before anything else. So as I read the summary of my resume, I decided it might need some editing…
Yes, this is really my summary of qualifications… I am in HR and can’t believe I thought this was useful…
- Professional and effective communicator with the ability to establish a positive rapport with internal and external customers
- Responsible and competent in high pressure situations, motivated and willing to put in 110%
- Successful in leading and managing projects
- Contributes to process improvement and strives to enhance job effectiveness
- Demonstrates innovation and helps achieve company wide goals through meeting challenges and exceeding expectations
Now here is a more realistic copy, who wants to hire me now?
- Professional and effective communicator with the ability to establish a positive rapport with internal and external customers, unless I have been up all night with a sick child. If that is the case, I stick to one syllable words and that sounds more like gibberish than communication. Positive rapport? Unlikely.
- Responsible and competent in high pressure situations, motivated and willing to put in 110% on some days. If it is my classroom volunteer day, my child’s birthday, the first day of school, the last day of school or sunny outside, I am willing to put in 72%.
- Successful in leading and managing projects only because I have learned the art of delegating so that I can spend more time with my kids.
- Contributes to process improvement and strives to enhance job effectiveness these are only so that I don’t have to work as hard to get the same results so I can spend more time with my kids.
- Demonstrates innovation and helps achieve company wide goals through meeting challenges and exceeding expectations the challenges I like to focus on include how to work less and spend more time with my family and I hope to exceed my children’s expectations of being present for them.
What is the truth behind your resume?
Speaking of spending more time with my kids, I made the very tough decision not to pursue my coaching dream at this time. I don’t want to give a serious passion anything less than my best. As I take stock of my life right now, there is no room to give my best to anything else. Hell, I can’t even give mediocre to anything else right now.
I am having a serious struggle with work life balance right now (as evidenced by my lack of writing) and just can’t pull any more time out of my a.. (absolutely crazy schedule, ahem). So I am focusing on restoring balance not going insane, and getting back to blogging (as I miss it and all of you) and will revisit coaching when my schedule permits. Thank to all those who have provided amazing support!
Now seriously, what’s going behind your resume? Tell the truth. The truth is always more delicious.
Leave a Reply
Pay It Forward
Slightly Off-Balance 
My resume makes me sound like a saint! And I don’t think you need the blue writing…establish rapport- how many times have you made your kids sit there and be nice to each other and like each other. responsible and confident in high pressure situations- how many times have you told your kids that they WILL endure a beating if they keep it up? It’s that you say it with conviction that makes people believe you!
See, you are so over qualified for any job! You should add mediator and nurse to your resume too!
My resume is written in crayon, on the back of a juice box.
Good for you for recognizing the difference between what you need, what you want and what you’re able to give. It will change day-to-day, but you have your priorities straight, which is a good start. Also, there’s one error in your revised resume – on the sunny days you can only commit 63%, max.
So glad you’re back – you were missed 😀
love, love love this.
72% sounds about right.
Especially if it’s sunny out!
But you are 100% Mom.
No matter what the weather is outside.
And that’s all that matters.
p.s. Your coaching dream isn’t going anywhere. There will always be people who can benefit from your inspiration. But you know where you are needed now, what you can handle first. And there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s all right, in fact.
Honestly, if I had my own company, I’d only hire parents who dealt with multiple kids at the same time . . . the amount of quick thinking and focus is something else.
Of course, for the interview, I’d blindfold them, have them describe how to perform a task to someone in the room while preparing & getting someone else to drink from a juice box.
I don’t know. I think I may want to hire you to parent MY kids.
And I agree w/ Julie, the coaching dream will be there, waiting for the right time. Take it from a gal who took 14 years to fulfill one of her dreams.
BTW, so happy to read your words, whenever they may come.
*smiles* True True 110%