I spent some time after dinner tonight sitting at the dining table with both girls, "working." Pumpkin was doing a Scooby Doo Activity Book (made more amusing by the fact that she has not yet seen a Scooby Doo show- I strongly suspect she would consider them too scary). Petunia was doing pages from her "I Can Paste" book. I was cutting out things for Petunia to paste onto her workbook pages, answering questions from Pumpkin like "what is an imposter?" and occasionally typing a few words into this post.
It was great. I have a picture in my head of the future, with me and the girls sitting at the table. The girls working on their homework and me working on... whatever I want to be working on. They'll occasionally ask me a question, but for the most part we'll just all be sitting there on our own things. Reality probably won't match the lovely picture in my head, but tonight gave me a glimpse of how my work and parenting could combine in the future, and I liked it.
---------------------------
The comments about various people's maternity leave preferences on my last post really reinforce my opinion that a "one size fits all" policy is NOT the way to go. I didn't say it in that post, but I think my optimal leave would have been ~4 months completely off, followed by ~3 months of part time work. Or something like that.
I am very sympathetic to the effort to increase maternity leave in the US, and I would prefer a uniform 1 year leave over the ridiculously short leave we have now. But I am not at all convinced that a blanket "everyone gets X amount of time off" policy is the best way to go.
I am most definitely not a policy wonk, so I don't really know what the best thing would be. I wonder if extending the paid family medical leave we have in California (and some other states) might be the way to go- instead of the 5 months at whatever percentage of my salary I ended up getting, maybe it could be up to one year, paid at 80% salary (capped at some value). It could be funded by an insurance type scheme, similar to how current paid family leave or disability leave is funded: we all pay in, and anyone who meets one of the qualifying conditions could claim. Since the employee's salary would be paid by the insurance fund while he or she was out, the employer would have the money usually used to pay the employee's salary to pay for a temporary employee or contractors to fill in during leave.
I'd keep the ability to use the leave to "top up" pay if the employee goes part time, too- we used that to enable us to split the fourth month after each child was born, and found that to be a really great option.
I'd add something to encourage more men to take the leave. Maybe assign the leave by qualifying event, and give each household a set number of months that can be split among the family members, with a maximum for each family member? For instance: 18 months total, but no more than 12 months for one person. Or something like that.
This may not be popular, but I think there needs to be some financial cost to the employee for taking leave, if only to encourage people to think about how much leave the truly want, instead of just taking "the standard." That is why I'd have the insurance pay out at 80%- but maybe 90% with a lower cap would be more fair. I don't actually know what California's percentage is, because I hit the cap, the percentage was different for the 6-8 weeks considered disability vs. the other time that was FMLA, and I also had private disability insurance one of the two times... so it was confusing, and I never did the math. We paid a small but manageable financial price for the leave I took. I'd set up the scheme so that people at lower incomes face a smaller financial penalty than people at higher incomes.
The chances of such a scheme being enacted probably approach zero, given the current political climate. But if we don't think about what we'd really want, we might find we trade one seriously suboptimal situation for another.
Feel free to describe your ideal scheme in the comments. I encourage you to think about unintended consequences, though- as I said in the last post, there is some evidence of discrimination against women with "standard" long leaves, and I have also heard anecdotes about the difficulty of finding child care if you want a shorter leave than the "standard." The ideal scheme would minimize these two problems. I fully acknowledge that the scheme I described above may not do that, though, and may have other problems I haven't seen (feel free to speculate on those in the comments, too).
--------------------------------
I mentioned in the last post that I was coming up for air since it was Pumpkin's last day of school and the End of Year Marathon of School Events was finally ending. But it was a short lived surfacing- I have an unusually busy schedule at work for the next 6 weeks or so- we are doing at least one "release"- either of a piece of software or a major system upgrade- every week. It should be... interesting. And we've got some things on the home calendar, too, not least of which is adjusting to doing the daily drop off/pick up for Pumpkin at a different location. So posting may be a little light for the next few weeks. Don't worry, though- I have lots of things I want to write about, so I'll be back at full strength as soon I can.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Monday, June 10, 2013
Ask Cloud: Handling an Extended Leave
I have had a question about taking an extended maternity leave queued up for an Ask Cloud post for several weeks. I made the rookie mistake of not minimizing my work commitments during the last couple of weeks of the school year and have just been flattened by a parade of school events competing with work deadlines. Tomorrow is the last day of school, so I'm coming up for air. Apologies to my anonymous correspondent for the long delay in posting this answer!
Also, I want to put a caveat up front: this is a very US-centric post. I realize that some of my international readers will read it and think about nothing other than how little leave time and legal protections US workers have. This is a fair observation (and feel free to make it)- but I'm going to focus on what can be done within the confines of our current system. I agree that the US system is imperfect, and I think we should change it. However, I also think that the European systems with long leaves are not perfect. Not every mother wants to take 1-2 years off after each birth (I did not- although I'd have liked a little more time than I had), and there is data hinting at discrimination against women in hiring, even in the egalitarian Scandinavian countries in which fathers take leave, too.
I am not at all qualified to expound on the policy options that would be fairest and have fewest unintended consequences, so I'm going to skip that altogether and focus on practical advice about how to get the leave you want without tanking your career in the imperfect system we have now.
I should perhaps also provide the details of my own maternity leaves. In both cases, I took 3 months off, followed by one month of working 3 days per week (Mr. Snarky stayed home those days, and worked the other two). The first time around, I then went back at 35 hours/week until my daughter was ~10 months old, when I switched jobs. The first leave occurred while I was an employee at a contracting company at which a lot of people had shifted schedules and where part time options were fairly common. The second leave occurred while I was the head of a small department at a small biotech company. No one had done a part time schedule before, and I had to submit a plan to convince the CEO that I could make the part time schedule work. I was laid off from that job when my second daughter was a little over a year old. I do not think my maternity leave arrangement had any impact on that decision at all.
Anyway, on to the question:
Anonymous is a research scientist in a university lab. For my non-US readers, this usually means a PhD level position with more stability than a postdoc, but not a principal investigator on grants. Anonymous didn't say exactly what the position entails, but from the context of the rest of the email, I think it is pretty close to the usual definition.
She writes that she loves what she does and is happy with her position, but...
"The one thing I struggle with the most, as far as the whole motherhood/scientist thing goes, is the maternity leave. The 12 weeks of FMLA feel too short and inadequate. Some of my colleagues take even less. Our university has a policy for up to 1 year leave of absence (unpaid) for employees if the department chair agrees to it. On one hand, I would feel totally out of line and guilty asking for 9-12 months leave. On the other hand, the policy is there - why not use it?
What's your take on the length of maternity leave and the options scientist moms have (or don't have)? How would you react if one of the people on your team asked for an extended leave of absence to take care of their child(ren)?"
I have some thoughts on this, and I'd also like to bring in some thoughts on returning to the work force after a few years out (to raise kids, care for a sick parent, or whatever). I want to weave these two things together because the crux of my advice is the same in each case: to get what you want, your best bet is to spend some serious time thinking about how to make what you want attractive to your employer (current or prospective).
Let's talk about Anonymous' case first. She wants to take advantage of a policy that is in place, but that is not normally used. I think she should use the policies that are in place if that is what she wants to do, but that there are ways to do so that maximize career risk and ways that minimize it.
I would approach this from the standpoint of what she could do to help ensure her projects stay on track while she's out. Perhaps she could come in once a week for some meetings (having arranged child care- yes, in an ideal world we could bring a baby along and expect people to work meetings around the baby's schedule, but that is not the world we live in, and I think it would be particularly problematic if you're trying to pack a lot of value into a short period of time). Perhaps she'd be willing to read and answer emails once or twice per day (this was my arrangement on my second maternity leave, when I was the head of a small department). Perhaps she'd be thrilled to have a part time arrangement.
She should also do some research into sources of funding for temporary help in the lab, to fill in during her absence. This is one area in which industrial scientists have a bit of an advantage. If your department isn't paying your salary, they can often tap into that money to pay a temporary employee or contractor. I have heard that some grants allow PIs to claim funds to pay for temporary help to cover family leave, but I do not know the details. Chances are, neither does Anonymous' supervisor. Sure, he or she could figure that out after talking to Anonymous, but Anonymous will be seen as much more professional and committed to the lab if she has this information on hand. Remember, the goal is not just to take the leave. It is to return from the leave to pick up a career that has not been damaged by the time off.
I would not recommend that Anonymous broach the subject with her supervisor until she has a concrete proposal or two worked out. Speaking from experience both as an employee and as a supervisor, your chances of success with your supervisor are greater if you have solutions for some of the problems your absence will cause.
She should also think about what her response will be if her supervisor says "no." The very first extended leave I negotiated was actually not to care for a baby- it was to travel around the pacific for four months. My case was helped by the fact that I was a contractor and could time the leave to be between assignments, minimizing disruption. It was also helped by the fact that my response to a "no" would have been to quit, and my supervisor knew that. Obviously, being willing to walk away gives you a strong negotiating position, but only if that is truly an option.
And what if you do walk away for a year or more? Can you get back in?
I think the answer is "yes," but that again, there are things that maximize your chances of success and things that minimize them.
I think there are three distinct stages to taking a long leave: before you go out, while you're out, and getting back in. I'll take them each in turn.
Before you go out, you want to do everything you can to make sure people think of you as a professional with strong skills. These are the people who you'll need to help you back in- so leave them thinking well of you. Obviously, you're awesome and have been doing awesome work and have an appropriately awesome reputation. Don't blow this by showing obvious signs of "short-timer's syndrome" as your end date draws near. Proactively working with your supervisor and colleagues on a transition plan would be a great idea. Look at the advice I gave Anonymous about handling a 9-12 month leave, and think about whether any of it makes sense in your case. Can you offer to answer questions if they come up in the weeks and months right after you go out? Can you help recruit and/or train your successor?
While you're out, consider taking steps to stay somewhat connected to your career. Obviously, you want to make sure this doesn't interfere with the primary purpose of taking the leave- if you are taking time out to focus on your kids, by all means, make them your primary focus. But if you decide you want some sort of outlet for the parts of you that aren't all about mothering, why not make that outlet relevant to your career? Ideas I've seen for keeping a connection with your career are to take a class, work to finish off a paper, offer to collaborate with a former adviser on a review article, and participate in a relevant volunteer project. At the very least, try to keep your network active. Go to lunch with colleagues. Look for a local conference that you can attend. Things like that.
When it comes time to get back in, you're going to need your network. I have to be honest: your chances of being hired into a position based on sending a resume in to a job listing are slim in any circumstances, but are next to none if you have anything on your resume that needs explanation- like a gap of several years since your last position. However, you CAN get back in. I have personally hired women back in after breaks. In every case, I made the hire based on a glowing recommendation from someone who knew the woman in question and went out of his way to make the recommendation.
You can also think about options such as being a temporary employee and contracting. Contracting reduces the risk for the hiring manager. Hiring is a PITA, but firing really sucks. Really. No one wants to make a hiring mistake. Contract to hire positions let the hiring manager test you out and see if you are really going to be a fast learner who quickly picks up the things that have changed during your absence from the workforce. A temporary position gets something current on your resume, even if you have to run another search in a few months.
I have seen people recommend going back to do another postdoc, and I know people for whom that has worked well. If you are going the contracting route, you can also consider offering a short term discount on your rates while you get up to speed. I know a couple of people who have used that technique successfully, as well.
My final bit of advice applies during all stages, and should be obvious, but is clearly not, since I've seen it violated so many times: don't diss the women who have made different choices. I was at a women in science event recently, and during a discussion of work-life balance, one woman got up and basically delivered a rant on why employers should help her back into the workforce. Her argument seemed to be that since she had made the sacrifice for the good of her children, who were spared the inferior experience of day care and also the parade of day care illnesses thanks to her willingness to stay home with them, employers should have to help her back in.
Um, no. Employers don't really owe you anything. The hiring manager might be an incredibly nice person, and is perhaps even sympathetic to your argument. But if you aren't going to help solve his or her problems, you aren't going to get hired. It is not about you. It is about them.
I actually tried to find the woman who gave the rant after the session ended, but could not. So I will tell you what I wanted to tell her: it is fine that she thinks that staying home was the best thing for her kids. But her rant broke the cardinal rule of job searching: never sound bitter. No one wants to hire someone who might turn out to be a congenital complainer. Also, she delivered a neat slap in the face to some of the people who are best positioned to be her allies on her way back in- mothers who chose to stay in the workforce, but who know full well what skills you are likely to develop as a mother. (I've always said that anyone who can consistently get more than one kid out of the house on time would make an excellent release manager, and probably also has the skills to be a project manager....) She should take a break from the networking events until she can be less angry about her experience- or at least hide that anger better. Is that fair? Maybe not. But it is real.
Having written all of this, I want to emphasize: these are the opinions of one woman. I have both taken slightly unusual leaves and seen my career survive and hired women back in after two or more years out of the workforce. However, my advice is purely anecdotal. I do not have data on what works best. Going off the "normal" path is inherently risky. That doesn't mean you shouldn't do it- a lot of great things in life come with risks. The way to handle risks isn't necessarily to avoid them, it is to analyze them and figure out how to minimize the chances of negative things happening while you pursue the things you want to do. To do that, you have to be honest with yourself about the risks, and make sure that you are truly OK with taking them.
OK, readers- what ideas and opinions do you have for our anonymous correspondent who wants a 9-12 month maternity leave or for the hypothetical person considering taking a multi-year break from the workforce?
Also, I want to put a caveat up front: this is a very US-centric post. I realize that some of my international readers will read it and think about nothing other than how little leave time and legal protections US workers have. This is a fair observation (and feel free to make it)- but I'm going to focus on what can be done within the confines of our current system. I agree that the US system is imperfect, and I think we should change it. However, I also think that the European systems with long leaves are not perfect. Not every mother wants to take 1-2 years off after each birth (I did not- although I'd have liked a little more time than I had), and there is data hinting at discrimination against women in hiring, even in the egalitarian Scandinavian countries in which fathers take leave, too.
I am not at all qualified to expound on the policy options that would be fairest and have fewest unintended consequences, so I'm going to skip that altogether and focus on practical advice about how to get the leave you want without tanking your career in the imperfect system we have now.
I should perhaps also provide the details of my own maternity leaves. In both cases, I took 3 months off, followed by one month of working 3 days per week (Mr. Snarky stayed home those days, and worked the other two). The first time around, I then went back at 35 hours/week until my daughter was ~10 months old, when I switched jobs. The first leave occurred while I was an employee at a contracting company at which a lot of people had shifted schedules and where part time options were fairly common. The second leave occurred while I was the head of a small department at a small biotech company. No one had done a part time schedule before, and I had to submit a plan to convince the CEO that I could make the part time schedule work. I was laid off from that job when my second daughter was a little over a year old. I do not think my maternity leave arrangement had any impact on that decision at all.
Anyway, on to the question:
Anonymous is a research scientist in a university lab. For my non-US readers, this usually means a PhD level position with more stability than a postdoc, but not a principal investigator on grants. Anonymous didn't say exactly what the position entails, but from the context of the rest of the email, I think it is pretty close to the usual definition.
She writes that she loves what she does and is happy with her position, but...
"The one thing I struggle with the most, as far as the whole motherhood/scientist thing goes, is the maternity leave. The 12 weeks of FMLA feel too short and inadequate. Some of my colleagues take even less. Our university has a policy for up to 1 year leave of absence (unpaid) for employees if the department chair agrees to it. On one hand, I would feel totally out of line and guilty asking for 9-12 months leave. On the other hand, the policy is there - why not use it?
What's your take on the length of maternity leave and the options scientist moms have (or don't have)? How would you react if one of the people on your team asked for an extended leave of absence to take care of their child(ren)?"
I have some thoughts on this, and I'd also like to bring in some thoughts on returning to the work force after a few years out (to raise kids, care for a sick parent, or whatever). I want to weave these two things together because the crux of my advice is the same in each case: to get what you want, your best bet is to spend some serious time thinking about how to make what you want attractive to your employer (current or prospective).
Let's talk about Anonymous' case first. She wants to take advantage of a policy that is in place, but that is not normally used. I think she should use the policies that are in place if that is what she wants to do, but that there are ways to do so that maximize career risk and ways that minimize it.
I would approach this from the standpoint of what she could do to help ensure her projects stay on track while she's out. Perhaps she could come in once a week for some meetings (having arranged child care- yes, in an ideal world we could bring a baby along and expect people to work meetings around the baby's schedule, but that is not the world we live in, and I think it would be particularly problematic if you're trying to pack a lot of value into a short period of time). Perhaps she'd be willing to read and answer emails once or twice per day (this was my arrangement on my second maternity leave, when I was the head of a small department). Perhaps she'd be thrilled to have a part time arrangement.
She should also do some research into sources of funding for temporary help in the lab, to fill in during her absence. This is one area in which industrial scientists have a bit of an advantage. If your department isn't paying your salary, they can often tap into that money to pay a temporary employee or contractor. I have heard that some grants allow PIs to claim funds to pay for temporary help to cover family leave, but I do not know the details. Chances are, neither does Anonymous' supervisor. Sure, he or she could figure that out after talking to Anonymous, but Anonymous will be seen as much more professional and committed to the lab if she has this information on hand. Remember, the goal is not just to take the leave. It is to return from the leave to pick up a career that has not been damaged by the time off.
I would not recommend that Anonymous broach the subject with her supervisor until she has a concrete proposal or two worked out. Speaking from experience both as an employee and as a supervisor, your chances of success with your supervisor are greater if you have solutions for some of the problems your absence will cause.
She should also think about what her response will be if her supervisor says "no." The very first extended leave I negotiated was actually not to care for a baby- it was to travel around the pacific for four months. My case was helped by the fact that I was a contractor and could time the leave to be between assignments, minimizing disruption. It was also helped by the fact that my response to a "no" would have been to quit, and my supervisor knew that. Obviously, being willing to walk away gives you a strong negotiating position, but only if that is truly an option.
And what if you do walk away for a year or more? Can you get back in?
I think the answer is "yes," but that again, there are things that maximize your chances of success and things that minimize them.
I think there are three distinct stages to taking a long leave: before you go out, while you're out, and getting back in. I'll take them each in turn.
Before you go out, you want to do everything you can to make sure people think of you as a professional with strong skills. These are the people who you'll need to help you back in- so leave them thinking well of you. Obviously, you're awesome and have been doing awesome work and have an appropriately awesome reputation. Don't blow this by showing obvious signs of "short-timer's syndrome" as your end date draws near. Proactively working with your supervisor and colleagues on a transition plan would be a great idea. Look at the advice I gave Anonymous about handling a 9-12 month leave, and think about whether any of it makes sense in your case. Can you offer to answer questions if they come up in the weeks and months right after you go out? Can you help recruit and/or train your successor?
While you're out, consider taking steps to stay somewhat connected to your career. Obviously, you want to make sure this doesn't interfere with the primary purpose of taking the leave- if you are taking time out to focus on your kids, by all means, make them your primary focus. But if you decide you want some sort of outlet for the parts of you that aren't all about mothering, why not make that outlet relevant to your career? Ideas I've seen for keeping a connection with your career are to take a class, work to finish off a paper, offer to collaborate with a former adviser on a review article, and participate in a relevant volunteer project. At the very least, try to keep your network active. Go to lunch with colleagues. Look for a local conference that you can attend. Things like that.
When it comes time to get back in, you're going to need your network. I have to be honest: your chances of being hired into a position based on sending a resume in to a job listing are slim in any circumstances, but are next to none if you have anything on your resume that needs explanation- like a gap of several years since your last position. However, you CAN get back in. I have personally hired women back in after breaks. In every case, I made the hire based on a glowing recommendation from someone who knew the woman in question and went out of his way to make the recommendation.
You can also think about options such as being a temporary employee and contracting. Contracting reduces the risk for the hiring manager. Hiring is a PITA, but firing really sucks. Really. No one wants to make a hiring mistake. Contract to hire positions let the hiring manager test you out and see if you are really going to be a fast learner who quickly picks up the things that have changed during your absence from the workforce. A temporary position gets something current on your resume, even if you have to run another search in a few months.
I have seen people recommend going back to do another postdoc, and I know people for whom that has worked well. If you are going the contracting route, you can also consider offering a short term discount on your rates while you get up to speed. I know a couple of people who have used that technique successfully, as well.
My final bit of advice applies during all stages, and should be obvious, but is clearly not, since I've seen it violated so many times: don't diss the women who have made different choices. I was at a women in science event recently, and during a discussion of work-life balance, one woman got up and basically delivered a rant on why employers should help her back into the workforce. Her argument seemed to be that since she had made the sacrifice for the good of her children, who were spared the inferior experience of day care and also the parade of day care illnesses thanks to her willingness to stay home with them, employers should have to help her back in.
Um, no. Employers don't really owe you anything. The hiring manager might be an incredibly nice person, and is perhaps even sympathetic to your argument. But if you aren't going to help solve his or her problems, you aren't going to get hired. It is not about you. It is about them.
I actually tried to find the woman who gave the rant after the session ended, but could not. So I will tell you what I wanted to tell her: it is fine that she thinks that staying home was the best thing for her kids. But her rant broke the cardinal rule of job searching: never sound bitter. No one wants to hire someone who might turn out to be a congenital complainer. Also, she delivered a neat slap in the face to some of the people who are best positioned to be her allies on her way back in- mothers who chose to stay in the workforce, but who know full well what skills you are likely to develop as a mother. (I've always said that anyone who can consistently get more than one kid out of the house on time would make an excellent release manager, and probably also has the skills to be a project manager....) She should take a break from the networking events until she can be less angry about her experience- or at least hide that anger better. Is that fair? Maybe not. But it is real.
Having written all of this, I want to emphasize: these are the opinions of one woman. I have both taken slightly unusual leaves and seen my career survive and hired women back in after two or more years out of the workforce. However, my advice is purely anecdotal. I do not have data on what works best. Going off the "normal" path is inherently risky. That doesn't mean you shouldn't do it- a lot of great things in life come with risks. The way to handle risks isn't necessarily to avoid them, it is to analyze them and figure out how to minimize the chances of negative things happening while you pursue the things you want to do. To do that, you have to be honest with yourself about the risks, and make sure that you are truly OK with taking them.
OK, readers- what ideas and opinions do you have for our anonymous correspondent who wants a 9-12 month maternity leave or for the hypothetical person considering taking a multi-year break from the workforce?
Saturday, June 08, 2013
Weekend Reading: The Heavy and Light Edition
I am trapped at my desk, monitoring a big upgrade my team is doing. My roll is minor- to tell people when to do the next step, and to make decisions when things don't go quite as planned. But I have to be online, because I don't want anyone to waste their weekend time waiting for a decision from me. Luckily, I have a weekend links post to write! I have a mix of serious links and fluff today. So, to the links. Let's do the serious things first:
First, several people in my Twitter feed tweeted out a link to this article in which a woman answers a letter from a Harvard professor who was concerned about her ability to balance family and career- 52 years after she received it. It is a good read.
This article in Salon about a bus driver who was fired for posting on Facebook about a student who said he was denied lunch highlights the shortcomings of the free/reduced cost school lunch program in many places. I think the level of food insecurity we have in the US is shameful. I think this is one of the problems that we convince ourselves is intractable, but the experience in other countries tells us otherwise. We are such a rich country. We could solve this problem if we wanted to.
Finally, Ta-Nehisi Coates replies to a question about what advice he would give to kids. The question is phrased for advice for poor urban kids in a specific location, but Coates answers more generally, and I think his answer is brilliant. I won't try to summarize it. Just go read it.
It reminds me of an experience I had in 6th grade that has stuck with me. There was a kid in my class who was the class clown, and was frequently in trouble. Let's call him Joe. His family originally came from Mexico, but he had been born in the US. This family history shouldn't have mattered- but it did, as I learned. One day, we were doing a project in class and the teacher paired us up. I was paired with Joe. In the course of the project, I realized he was clearly just as smart as I was, although he rarely showed that in class. We got to talking about our career aspirations. At the time, I wanted to be either a doctor or an anthropologist. Joe said he wanted to be a mechanic.
Now, there is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to be a mechanic (or being a mechanic). It is a fine career goal, and I do not mean to disparage it at all. What struck me, though, was why Joe wanted to be a mechanic, and how he reacted to my question about that. He had an uncle who was a mechanic, and that uncle was the most successful person he knew. To Joe, mechanic was as high as he could aim. It wasn't that he'd considered being a doctor or an anthropologist or President or what not and decided that they didn't sound as good as being a mechanic. It was that he didn't consider those other options at all. It was clear from how he answered me that he hadn't even thought he might go to college. I, meanwhile, had dreams that required not just college but post-graduate degrees.
I was just 12 years old. I didn't really understand why Joe and I had such different ideas about the limits on our lives. I knew I lived in a slightly nicer neighborhood, and of course I knew I was white and he was Hispanic. I had, up until that point, not really thought much about what those things meant to the rest of our lives, and to be honest, I didn't really think much about it right then. But that conversation stuck in my memory, and as I got older and learned more, the context around it filled in for me.
I still don't know what people like me can do to show kids like Joe that they can dream past the bounds of their neighborhoods. Ta-Nehisi Coates' article is a powerful reminder of the fact that we need to try.
Now for the lightweight things:
I forget where I came across this article with cool pictures of beaches from the air, but the pictures are great.
And lets close with a big smile. Mommyshorts has been running a competition to find the most epic baby hair. Her 12 finalists are great. My own babies were mostly bald, so I have no direct experience with epic baby hair. It is awfully cute, isn't it?
First, several people in my Twitter feed tweeted out a link to this article in which a woman answers a letter from a Harvard professor who was concerned about her ability to balance family and career- 52 years after she received it. It is a good read.
This article in Salon about a bus driver who was fired for posting on Facebook about a student who said he was denied lunch highlights the shortcomings of the free/reduced cost school lunch program in many places. I think the level of food insecurity we have in the US is shameful. I think this is one of the problems that we convince ourselves is intractable, but the experience in other countries tells us otherwise. We are such a rich country. We could solve this problem if we wanted to.
Finally, Ta-Nehisi Coates replies to a question about what advice he would give to kids. The question is phrased for advice for poor urban kids in a specific location, but Coates answers more generally, and I think his answer is brilliant. I won't try to summarize it. Just go read it.
It reminds me of an experience I had in 6th grade that has stuck with me. There was a kid in my class who was the class clown, and was frequently in trouble. Let's call him Joe. His family originally came from Mexico, but he had been born in the US. This family history shouldn't have mattered- but it did, as I learned. One day, we were doing a project in class and the teacher paired us up. I was paired with Joe. In the course of the project, I realized he was clearly just as smart as I was, although he rarely showed that in class. We got to talking about our career aspirations. At the time, I wanted to be either a doctor or an anthropologist. Joe said he wanted to be a mechanic.
Now, there is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to be a mechanic (or being a mechanic). It is a fine career goal, and I do not mean to disparage it at all. What struck me, though, was why Joe wanted to be a mechanic, and how he reacted to my question about that. He had an uncle who was a mechanic, and that uncle was the most successful person he knew. To Joe, mechanic was as high as he could aim. It wasn't that he'd considered being a doctor or an anthropologist or President or what not and decided that they didn't sound as good as being a mechanic. It was that he didn't consider those other options at all. It was clear from how he answered me that he hadn't even thought he might go to college. I, meanwhile, had dreams that required not just college but post-graduate degrees.
I was just 12 years old. I didn't really understand why Joe and I had such different ideas about the limits on our lives. I knew I lived in a slightly nicer neighborhood, and of course I knew I was white and he was Hispanic. I had, up until that point, not really thought much about what those things meant to the rest of our lives, and to be honest, I didn't really think much about it right then. But that conversation stuck in my memory, and as I got older and learned more, the context around it filled in for me.
I still don't know what people like me can do to show kids like Joe that they can dream past the bounds of their neighborhoods. Ta-Nehisi Coates' article is a powerful reminder of the fact that we need to try.
Now for the lightweight things:
I forget where I came across this article with cool pictures of beaches from the air, but the pictures are great.
And lets close with a big smile. Mommyshorts has been running a competition to find the most epic baby hair. Her 12 finalists are great. My own babies were mostly bald, so I have no direct experience with epic baby hair. It is awfully cute, isn't it?
Thursday, June 06, 2013
Good Things
I spent last weekend in San Francisco, visiting a good friend. I flew up on Saturday morning and flew home late Sunday afternoon. Notice is said "I"- this was a solo trip. Taking a weekend away without Mr. Snarky or the kids was one of the items on my 2013 personal fun list, and I am so glad I did it. I had a great time catching up with my friend, exploring San Francisco (she's recently moved there, and I haven't been there in over a decade).
One of the things we did was check out Dandelion Chocolate, which is the small-batch chocolatier I mentioned in last week's weekend reading post. This turned out to be an awesome find. They had some samples out, and I was amazed by the difference I could taste between two bars made from different beans. So I bought a tasting sample pack, and my family and I have been enjoying comparing them. They are all delicious- but also distinctly different. I had no idea there is so much variation in the taste of chocolate beans. It makes me wonder two things: (1) how do the big manufacturers ensure consistent taste (I'm guessing it is a combination of using a mix of beans every time and the extra things that are added) and (2) why isn't chocolate tasting already a big thing?
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In book news... Taming the Work Week is now available at Barnes and Noble for the Nook and in various formats directly from the publisher.
And of course, you can still get it for the Kindle on Amazon.
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And that's all I have for you tonight, because I made the rookie mistake of not minimizing work calendar commitments during the last couple of weeks of school, and then we compounded the error by deciding we should refinance our house right now... so things are a bit busy here right now. It is a good thing I have some really good chocolate to help me through....
One of the things we did was check out Dandelion Chocolate, which is the small-batch chocolatier I mentioned in last week's weekend reading post. This turned out to be an awesome find. They had some samples out, and I was amazed by the difference I could taste between two bars made from different beans. So I bought a tasting sample pack, and my family and I have been enjoying comparing them. They are all delicious- but also distinctly different. I had no idea there is so much variation in the taste of chocolate beans. It makes me wonder two things: (1) how do the big manufacturers ensure consistent taste (I'm guessing it is a combination of using a mix of beans every time and the extra things that are added) and (2) why isn't chocolate tasting already a big thing?
------------------------
In book news... Taming the Work Week is now available at Barnes and Noble for the Nook and in various formats directly from the publisher.
And of course, you can still get it for the Kindle on Amazon.
------------------------
And that's all I have for you tonight, because I made the rookie mistake of not minimizing work calendar commitments during the last couple of weeks of school, and then we compounded the error by deciding we should refinance our house right now... so things are a bit busy here right now. It is a good thing I have some really good chocolate to help me through....
Monday, June 03, 2013
The Joy of Problem-Solving
I'm in one of those time periods that crop up occasionally, in which I have an unusual number of high priority things going on both at work and at home. I can absorb a crunch time in either my work life or my home life without too much angst, but when they gang up on me, I really feel it.
The saving grace this time is that most of the high priority things going on are good- including at work. For instance, I had a great day at work on Friday. I cleared the BS work early and got to spend most of the day working on one of my favorite sorts of technical problems. We're starting to build a system to capture a new type of data, and I'm designing the database to store it. This is complex data that will be accessed in multiple ways by a variety of applications, so it is worth taking the time to think about its natural structure, rather than just letting the requirements of a single application dictate the database design.
I genuinely love this part of my job. I write down the operational requirements, as gathered from the users and the programmers, and mix in my own scientific and technical knowledge, perhaps augmented by a little research. I sketch out ideas (usually on paper), jot down questions, and add more ideas, which produce more questions... until I get stuck. I hit some aspect of the data for which the optimal storage structure is not obvious to me, and I can't immediately think of the questions I need to ask to determine the best structure. I stare at my sketches and my list of questions for a few minutes, waiting to see if something comes to me. And if it doesn't, I go do something else. I work on another task, or I read something random on the internet. (Which of these I do depends on how many other deadlines I have looming and how tired my brain feels.) If it is close to lunch, I eat and then take one more look at my papers before heading out for my walk.
I describe this process as "loading a problem into my brain and then looking away." It is by far the best problem-solving process I've found. And I love it. I love the satisfying mental effort of dissecting the work at hand until I have a clear view of what it is I do not know how to do. I love the feeling of my brain stretching to wrap itself around the gap in my understanding. And I love the almost magical way my brain can fill in that gap if I stop looking at it.
Once the gap is filled, I fill in the new details on my design and I keep going, until I hit the next non-obvious thing. Then the entire process repeats.
This problem-solving process- and the happiness it brings me- is not limited to technical problems. I have similar experiences when sorting through complex project plans, which can be like giant logic problems. My recent experiments with using kanban methods for program management also came from this process. I had a management problem I couldn't see how to solve. I loaded it into my brain and looked away for a surprisingly long time. I picked around the edges of the problem, but couldn't unravel it. I read things I thought might give me ideas, and then I looked away again. Then the idea came to me. I refined it and implemented it, and so far, I'm happy with the results.
To be honest, I get a similar kick out of solving organizational and logistical problems at home, and I use a similar process for it. Basically, anytime I confront a problem I don't know how to solve, I take the same approach: break it down, go as far as I can, then load it into my brain and let my brain magically fill in the gap or suggest new things to research. It can take a long time to work, but I have not had this process fail me yet.
I think a lot of people use a similar process for solving problems, or doing anything creative (and solving a problem is creative: you are creating the solution). A lot of people don't really appreciate how important that "look away" part is, though. My friend @smbaxtersd tweeted a link to this blog post on the creative process today, and I think it really captures the wry, self-effacing humor about the creative process that is so common. I used to feel the same way. I'd try to skip the "look away" step, forcing myself to continue to stare at the papers with the problem. It didn't work. I now consider looking away to be an essential part of the process. In fact, it is how I know I've got a good, interesting problem to solve. If I can solve it without looking away, it was too easy. And while I'm perfectly happy to go months and months at home without a hard problem to solve, if I go too long at work with out a problem I have to look away from to solve, I get restless and unhappy, the same way I get restless if I go too long without any physical exercise. So Friday was a very good day indeed.
What is your problem solving process? Do you like it?
The saving grace this time is that most of the high priority things going on are good- including at work. For instance, I had a great day at work on Friday. I cleared the BS work early and got to spend most of the day working on one of my favorite sorts of technical problems. We're starting to build a system to capture a new type of data, and I'm designing the database to store it. This is complex data that will be accessed in multiple ways by a variety of applications, so it is worth taking the time to think about its natural structure, rather than just letting the requirements of a single application dictate the database design.
I genuinely love this part of my job. I write down the operational requirements, as gathered from the users and the programmers, and mix in my own scientific and technical knowledge, perhaps augmented by a little research. I sketch out ideas (usually on paper), jot down questions, and add more ideas, which produce more questions... until I get stuck. I hit some aspect of the data for which the optimal storage structure is not obvious to me, and I can't immediately think of the questions I need to ask to determine the best structure. I stare at my sketches and my list of questions for a few minutes, waiting to see if something comes to me. And if it doesn't, I go do something else. I work on another task, or I read something random on the internet. (Which of these I do depends on how many other deadlines I have looming and how tired my brain feels.) If it is close to lunch, I eat and then take one more look at my papers before heading out for my walk.
I describe this process as "loading a problem into my brain and then looking away." It is by far the best problem-solving process I've found. And I love it. I love the satisfying mental effort of dissecting the work at hand until I have a clear view of what it is I do not know how to do. I love the feeling of my brain stretching to wrap itself around the gap in my understanding. And I love the almost magical way my brain can fill in that gap if I stop looking at it.
 |
| I need the mental equivalent of this |
This problem-solving process- and the happiness it brings me- is not limited to technical problems. I have similar experiences when sorting through complex project plans, which can be like giant logic problems. My recent experiments with using kanban methods for program management also came from this process. I had a management problem I couldn't see how to solve. I loaded it into my brain and looked away for a surprisingly long time. I picked around the edges of the problem, but couldn't unravel it. I read things I thought might give me ideas, and then I looked away again. Then the idea came to me. I refined it and implemented it, and so far, I'm happy with the results.
To be honest, I get a similar kick out of solving organizational and logistical problems at home, and I use a similar process for it. Basically, anytime I confront a problem I don't know how to solve, I take the same approach: break it down, go as far as I can, then load it into my brain and let my brain magically fill in the gap or suggest new things to research. It can take a long time to work, but I have not had this process fail me yet.
I think a lot of people use a similar process for solving problems, or doing anything creative (and solving a problem is creative: you are creating the solution). A lot of people don't really appreciate how important that "look away" part is, though. My friend @smbaxtersd tweeted a link to this blog post on the creative process today, and I think it really captures the wry, self-effacing humor about the creative process that is so common. I used to feel the same way. I'd try to skip the "look away" step, forcing myself to continue to stare at the papers with the problem. It didn't work. I now consider looking away to be an essential part of the process. In fact, it is how I know I've got a good, interesting problem to solve. If I can solve it without looking away, it was too easy. And while I'm perfectly happy to go months and months at home without a hard problem to solve, if I go too long at work with out a problem I have to look away from to solve, I get restless and unhappy, the same way I get restless if I go too long without any physical exercise. So Friday was a very good day indeed.
What is your problem solving process? Do you like it?
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