by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

Flowers and jewelry make nice Mother’s Day presents, but a recent survey from CareerBuilder uncovered what working mothers really long for: more quality time with their families. In fact, many would be willing to trade a higher salary for a more flexible schedule.

The survey, which  reached out to 880 women who are employed full-time with children under the age of 18 living at home, discovered that:

• 43% of working moms said they would take a pay cut if it meant they could spend more time with their kids
• 34% said they would be willing to give up 10% or more of their salaries

You know that work/life balance issues have gotten serious when people are willing to give up a good chunk of their paychecks for some relief. According to the survey:

• 34% of working moms said they spend less than three hours per day with their children

• 24% said work had negatively impacted the relationships they have with their children
• 27% had missed two or more significant events in their child’s life in the last year
• 17% reported they had missed three or more
• 16% of working moms reported bringing work home at least three days a week

For many of these working mothers, a little bit more flexibility would make a whole lot of difference. The good news is that CareerBuilder.com has also found that more and more companies are recognizing the importance of offering options like telecommuting and flexible work schedules. 

If you’re struggling to balance the demands of work and parenthood, keep in mind that there may be ways to negotiate a more flexible schedule at the office. Even if your company doesn’t advertise the availability of these work arrangements, you may be able to work something out with your manager. The key is to approach it as a business conversation and look for compromises that will give you more flexibility for family demands without leaving your company in the lurch.

And if your current company doesn’t see the value of supporting work/life balance, there are other companies out there that do. To find them, start by checking out the Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For (in particular, see the companies ranked highest for work/life balance, telecommuting and other benefits) and the Working Mother Top Companies rankings.

Popularity: 5%

by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

It’s a beautiful day in New York City. I just returned from reconnecting over lunch with one of my favorite former bosses, who left the world of big corporate to become Chief Marketing Officer for an up-and-coming smaller company. We had a great time catching up and comparing notes about life outside the cubicle farm.

Then, on my way to the subway, I passed the sign in the photo. First of all, A+ for clever marketing. This particular flower and plant shop  is located in midtown Manhattan in a sea of office towers and just steps from  the Grand Central Terminal commuter hub.  I would bet that more than a few harried office workers paused when they saw that sign and picked up a pretty posy to brighten up their cube. I almost went in and bought something and I actually like my job.

Looking for other ways  to brighten up your work day? Check out the interesting and educational online diversions  below: 

• Alltop — Visit Alltop to find the best blogs on your favorite topics. This directory is the latest brainchild of entrepreneurship guru Guy Kawasaki and is guaranteed to keep you entertained for hours. I discovered the site after my blog was added to the Careers section and have since been exploring lots of cool new blogs about career topics and other fun stuff like movies, wine, and excessive cuteness.

• Why Most People End Up Hating Their Jobs — Pinny Cohen has an interesting post about how specialization can cause job dissatisfaction. 

• GigZig — GigZig is one of my favorite online career planning tools. It’s a great way to see all of the different future career options that are possible from where you are now. Enter your current job title and see all of the different future careers that might await you (based on info submitted by the thousands of people who have completed PayScale surveys). Or type in your dream job and see the different paths others have taken to get there.

Popularity: 19%

by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

There’s an interesting article on Yahoo! (by way of AllBusiness.com) titled  5 Ways to Keep Your Job During a Recession.

There are a lot of articles like this one popping up, so it’s pretty clear that people are feeling job security anxiety these days. And this piece features some good advice. It’s always a good idea to boost your visibility (in positive ways only, of course) and marketability. Another tip that wasn’t mentioned — focus on maintaining a strong relationship with your boss (and, ideally, your boss’s boss) and make sure he/she knows about all of the valuable things that you do. Make sure that decision makers are aware of the value that you provide to the company.

However, I think the most valuable advice comes in the conclusion of the article: "And, because there’s no guarantee that you will retain your job in a recession, no matter how hard you try, it doesn’t hurt to be prepared. On your own time, update your resume. Also, make sure that you are still networking with old bosses, coworkers, and business contacts. Don’t wait until you are laid off to keep your contacts and resume fresh. You will get better results if you are prepared ahead of time."

Amen. The bottom line  is that there is no way to control whether you’ll keep your job during a recession or even during a strong economy. Today, all corporations go through layoffs and it’s hard to predict when or how they are going to happen. It’s not only companies in underperforming sectors that lay people off. You can waste a lot of time and energy worrying about layoffs that would be better spent preparing to minimize any negative fallout if it does happen.

I don’t mean to be a Debbie Downer, but I think people should keep in mind that strong performance is no guarantee that you’ll stick around. I have seen many valuable employees get laid off and many slackers survive job cuts. I have wasted many hours gossiping about layoff rumors, speculating about the safety of my job, and ostentatiously "adding value" in every meeting to show how indispensable I was. All of that while I could have been working on my resume.

The truth is that layoff decisions are often made for reasons that have nothing to do with performance. Sometimes an entire department is laid off or just the people who make the highest salaries in a certain group.

That’s why you can’t ever take it personally. Future employers know that getting laid off is no reflection on your value as an employee or a person. In fact, most job candidates at this point can probably boast at least one lay-off on their resumes.

So yes, you should keep performing well. This is no time to slack off. But stop gossiping, worrying, and biting your nails. Instead, use your spare time to step up your passive job search efforts and start looking for your next position. Even if you don’t end up needing a new job, it’s always a good idea to keep your options open.

Popularity: 21%

by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

I am very excited to report that Publishers Weekly has reviewed Escape from Corporate America: A Practical Guide to Creating the Career of Your Dreams (which will be published on May 13).

If you click through, you’ll see that my write-up comes right after reviews for two other very interesting-sounding May titles — Swish: My Quest to Become the Gayest Person Ever by Joel Derfner and Sex: How to Do Everything by Em & Lo.  It’s hard to compete for attention with titles like those, but here’s what PW had to say about Escape from Corporate America:

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Escape from Corporate America: A Practical Guide to Creating the Career of Your Dreams

Pamela Skillings. Ballantine

Journalist Skillings aims to rescue Americans from corporate tedium in this entertaining and informative guide to walking away from an established—albeit stultifying—job and forging a more rewarding career. With insight and humor, Skillings enumerates the stages of “Corporate Disillusionment” and the features of the “toxic workplace”—the bullying bosses, moronic co-workers, “terminal boredom” and rampant racism and sexism. A multitude of questionnaires, exercises and worksheets helps readers determine their dream job, assess expenses and assets, and plot an escape plan to break free of corporate life without going bankrupt. Skillings also provides pointers to those readers who simply want to be happier in their current jobs—including negotiating for more flexible hours, telecommuting and taking sabbaticals. Vignettes of successful fugitives from the corporate world populate the book and an extremely useful “Escape Tool Kit” supplies information on where and how to find career coaches, health insurance, job listings and a wealth of other much needed resources when embarking on career change. Comprehensive, informative and witty, this book will be indispensable to those looking to start new careers with concrete plans and well-defined goals. (May)

Popularity: 24%

by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

Decades ago, our grandparents would have had easy answers to that question. They would have pointed at a field harvested, a box of widgets manufactured, or at least a pile of papers processed. For knowledge workers in the Information Age, it is much harder to identify the tangible results of a day in the office.

Almost everything that we do is virtual. We debate in meetings, answer emails, fight through bureaucracy, and type away on our computers. The result for many is frustration and decreased job satisfaction. A great article by Jared Sandberg in The Wall Street Journal analyzes the effect of intangible work results on employee satisfaction and makes some great points.

I was struck by the quotes from successful knowledge workers who said that they envy people with lower-paying and less prestigious jobs that offer immediate and tangible feelings of accomplishment. One insurance broker even cited his envy of  Mr. Fred Flinstone, who always seemed so satisfied to slide down that dinosaur’s tail when the whistle blew at the end of a work day at the quarry.

The article also speculated that these feelings of frustration may be partially responsible for the boom in weekend do-it-yourselfers. A management consultant confessed that she took up needlework to get the feelings of control and accomplishment that she was missing at work.

I can definitely relate to the sentiments quoted in the article. I used to leave the office at the end of the day exhausted, but feeling like I had just spent hours running on a hamster wheel. Not every day, but far too often. 

I don’t think this feeling is inevitable in the Information Age, though I do think it’s hard to avoid in many bureaucratic corporate environments. Sandberg suggests that setting meaningful short-term work goals can help people feel more satisfied. Making to-do lists can also help. It’s an undeniably great feeling to cross an item off the list. Cutting back on meetings and unnecessary red tape can also make you more productive.

Working for myself, I still spend a lot of time on my computer, but I also feel a strong sense of accomplishment almost every day. The drawback of working for myself is that I never get to slide down the dinosaur’s tail when the bell rings at the end of the day. I often work late into the night, but I have autonomy over where, when, and how I work. For me, that has significantly boosted my job satisfaction even when my daily work results are hard to define.

What’s your take on the impact of sense of accomplishment on your job satisfaction?

Popularity: 20%

by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

Delta Airlines is offering voluntary severance packages to thousands of employees, according to a recent AP story. Higher fuel prices and a weak economy have prompted the move, which aims to cut 2,000 front-line, administrative and management jobs. 

Employees who accept the offers will receive severance payements as well as travel privileges and additional benefits to help them with managing their career transitions.

While the announcement of job cuts is rarely good news for a company, the offer of voluntary severance packages can be a fantastic opportunity for those who are contemplating a career change or a complete escape from Corporate America. Most voluntary severance packages come with at least a couple of months of salary and benefits and often other perks to sweeten the deal. 

Several of the corporate escape artists that I interviewed were able to jump start their new careers or businesses because of voluntary severance packages. I remember a time when I fervently prayed that I would be laid off with severance. There may be some risk involved in "taking a package" in an uncertain economy, but it may also be too good an opportunity to pass up.

If you’re tempted by a severance package offer, take the time to sit down and do the math:

• With severance payments and any savings you’ve socked away, how long will you be able to pay your bills without additional income?
• How long is it likely to take for you to find a new job or get a new income source up and running (like your own business or a freelance career)?
• Is your job likely to be at risk if you DON’T take a package? If it seems likely that there will be additional  non-voluntary job cuts at your firm and that your job could be vulnerable,  you may be better off leaving now (assuming that it’s financially viable). Voluntary severance packages are often sweeter deals than the standard packages offered to downsized employees.

If you’d like to leave, but have concerns about finances or benefits, it may help to consult a financial advisor and get some expert guidance. If you are struggling with other issues — like whether you really want to leave or what you’re going to do next — a career counselor can help you to evaluate your options and do any necessary research.

In any case, it’s important to look at the potential opportunities represented by a voluntary severance offer  After all, it would take you months to save up  enough money to equal a generous severance payout. That cash can provide a nice safety net while you get a new business up and running, look for a new job, or navigate a career change.

Popularity: 23%

by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

As you probably know by now, JP Morgan has announced that it will acquire  former rival Bear Stearns for a bargain basement price of $2 share. The deal was helped along by the federal government amid fears that a collapse of Bear Stearns could have disastrous effects on the global financial markets. 

Bear Stearns was said to be the the most exposed to risky bets on the subprime mortgage market and a CNN poll shows that most resondents were more annoyed than relieved by the bailout and viewed it as "rewarding bad behavior.’

A JP Morgan spokesman would not comment on plans for Bear Stearns’ 14,000 employees around the world.  I know what it’s like to work for a big, historic financial services firm during an unexpected collapse and bailout.  I was in the public relations department at Barings, the U.K. merchant bank that  financed the Napoleonic Wars and the Louisiana Purchase, when one "rogue trader" (eventually played by Ewan McGregor in the movie about the event) brought down the whole firm.

Eventually, ING swooped in to buy us out and absorb us. That proved to be a dramatic lesson learned at my first job out of college. I went on to experience many more dramatic developments at my places of employment — another corporate bankruptcy, a major merger, and many acquisitions and reorganizations.

I can certainly sympathize with those at Bear Stearns and JP Morgan (and other Wall Street firms battling disappointing quarterly results). It’s hard to stay focused on work when you’re worried about your job and how all of the drama is going to play out.  When you work for a big firm like Bear Stearns (or Barings), you don’t imagine you’ll ever have to worry about the whole company going down the tubes. You may expect layoffs and reorganizations, but you don’t anticipate waking up to find that the entire firm is on the brink of collapse and there are Daily News reporters waiting outside your office building.

I imagine that the big financial services industry recruiters will be fielding a lot of calls today. Back in the day at Barings, I was polishing my resume within moments of hearing the news. The encouraging news is that I had a new job lined up before the first round of layoffs hit after the reorganization.

There’s not much you can do to prevent  being laid off (the names on those downsizing lists are rarely chosen based on performance), but you can take charge of your career by keeping your options open and developing a solid Plan B. See my post at Lifehack about how to prepare for a possible layoff.

Popularity: 21%

by Pamela Skillings      Send to a friend

According to a new survey from the Financial Women’s Association, women who work in finance are still paid less than men for comparable work and have made little progress on the equal pay front since 1998.

96% of the 259 association members surveyed said that women are paid less. This is exactly the same response received to the same question a decade ago in the Financial Women’s Association’s 1998 survey. When asked about improvements over the last three years, only 10% felt that pay parity had improved.

The survey also revealed that nearly two-thirds of  respondents consider their gender a factor that holds them back in their careers in the financial industry. Many cited a lack of access to decision-makers, mentors, or the type of assignments that are critical for career advancement. Some of the specific obstacles perceived as obstacles to women’s career advancement were:

• "Old boys’ neworks"
• Women failing to support other women
• Female stereotypes
• Family obligations
• Limited access to flex time/part-time
• Lack of political savvy and "ability to play the game"
• Ethnicity

Is anyone else starting to feel really depressed? I worked in the financial services industry for many years and I must admit that I witnessed a lot of  these obstacles firsthand. In at least one position, I know I earned significantly less than a male colleague with less responsibility, fewer years of experience, and lower performance scores. I also remember well feeling shut out of the old boys’ network and many lovely specific incidents that I won’t get into here.

So I’m not surprised that these  factors are still issues. I guess what bothers me is the fact that these issues are still so common. And the fact that there have been no improvements since 2002 (at least) despite all of the happy corporate talk at big companies about diversity and on-ramping and encouraging women leaders.

Is the financial services industry particularly unfair to women or is this a symptom of a bigger issue across industries? In my research for Escape from Corporate America, I was encouraged to learn about great programs to promote diversity and  flexibility at many forward-thinking and employee-focused firms. Unfortunately, these companies seem to still be exceptions to the rule when it comes to fair treatment of all employees, regardless of gender and ethnicity.

What do you think? I’d love to hear from financial services industry employees about their response to this survey and whether they think the results are representative.

Popularity: 23%