As this is the final episode of the first season of “How to Smash the Motherhood Penalty”, I wanted to reflect on what I have learnt from taking the leap and making this series. And I also wanted to share what I would do if I had a magic wand. It is a question I have asked all my guests – if they had a magic wand that would make the biggest impact on smashing the motherhood penalty – what would it be? So, it is only fair that I also answer this question. Especially as I have been informed and educated on my answer after listening to all my expert guests in this season.

Thank you for supporting and listening to Season One – please let me know what you have thought about it and if you are keen for more! And what other motherhood penalty smashers I can interview? Who is doing this work that I need to amplify?

I was delighted to be interviewed in this final episode by my daughter Rose. Very appropriate given the purpose of my work is to smash the motherhood penalty so that our children and their children never have to experience it.

I share with Rose what I have learnt so far by making this podcast including:

- Seeing procrastination simply as fear showing up and how to move through it.

- The importance of listening to your whispers as do know what you need.

- The power of stories to help us feel seen.

- Why the phrase “I’m lucky” is one that I wish I did not hear as much as I do.

- My magic wand that will smash gendered caregiving norms. We are not there yet.

- How there can be a cloak of secrecy on what is really happening with work at home.

- Using the words “sotto voce” which I probably pronounce wrong!

- My favourite quote from Anna Funder’s book “Wifedom” which speaks to how complicated work at home gets completed.

- Leaning into hard conversations.

- The power of measuring what men are doing. This is the shift we need.

- Education and support for parents is overdue and needed.

Resources Discussed:

“Atomic Habits” by James Clear – as James says, “motivation often comes after starting”.

“Wifedom: Mrs Orwell’s Invisible Life” by Anna Funder

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her business in 2019 to put a care wrap around working parents at the hardest time in their career.

She is an Executive Coach, the recipient of the 2022 Jaguar/Viva She Sets the Pace Community

Grant, alumni of the 2021 NZ Leadership Programme, and a Swiftie (a lifelong Taylor Swift fan). 

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz

www.worksforeveryone.co.nz

https://www.instagram.com/worksforeveryone/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-mclean-9176217/

In this episode we talk with Michelle Russell, General Manager, Talent and Culture, for ANZ NZ and the Pacific. It was a special conversation recorded in the recent school holidays and a unique blend of Michelle’s story long with her observations of the workplace and what is needed to smash the motherhood penalty. She is a fierce supporter of parents continuing to grow their careers and to do it “their way”.

For Michelle, ANZ has been a wonderful place to grow her career over 16 years and become a parent. She has had two experiences of returning to work after parental which we discuss including her return during the global pandemic. Michelle’s insights around the levers that are going to smash the motherhood penalty are powerful and they include disrupting the home norms of caregiving and focusing on the little things at work to help parents feel seen.

Our conversation covers the above and much more:

- The real FOMO of stepping out of the business for 6 months when on parental leave.

- The common theme of having a partner at home or someone who supports your career.

- Being “welcomed back” to work versus “just slotting back in”.

- The importance of “while you away” meetings to help you feel seen. Being conscious of what has changed and letting them know. Little things can make us feel like a fish out of water.

- Generous paid parental leave can minimise the penalty – Kiwisaver and leave accruing.

- The power of a mentor (and conversations that Michelle has) to help you believe that youcan return to the same role – but you can do it differently. “Do it your way”.

- Relationship work allocation falls into a rhythm way before having children. This dynamic needs to change from the start.

- We don’t lean into the shift that needs to happen in relationships when it comes to caregiving.”

- The power of Dads thinking “What could log parental leave do for my career? Not what will I miss out on.

- The home norms are the game changer. Without these – policies will never be fully taken up.

- Have the challenging conversations at home and it will lead to challenging conversations at work.

Resources Discussed

“Untamed” by Glennon Doyle

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her business in 2019 to put a care wrap around working parents at the hardest time in their career.

She is an Executive Coach, the recipient of the 2022 Jaguar/Viva She Sets the Pace Community Grant, alumni of the 2021 NZ Leadership Programme, and a Swiftie (a lifelong Taylor Swift fan). 

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz

www.worksforeveryone.co.nz

https://www.instagram.com/worksforeveryone/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-mclean-9176217/

This week, our guest is Charlotte Ward, the Chief People Officer for Kiwibank. I reached out to Charlotte when I saw that they had created a part time role for one of their senior leaders when they returned from parental leave. Creating senior roles that can be completed in part time hours is one of the ways we will smash the motherhood penalty. This is how we can continue to build our careers instead of side stepping it. Charlotte very generously shares her story, shines a light on how her family works, and provides observations from her career on how we can re-imagine the workplace so that it works for everyone. 

It is a conversation that I feel lucky to have had and not only because we laughed a lot but because we discussed ideas that included:

• The importance of conversations at home about how caregiving will happen in your family.
• How gender norms start early – even with how dances are taught in primary schools. 
• “Workplaces are built for Don Drapers” and more goodness from Michelle King’s book “The Fix”.
• Whether our definitions of success need to be updated. 
• The stories that women can tell ourselves that by themselves almost penalise us.
• Why we need to question the way the workplace works – and to put a focus on outcomes not time spent at a desk.
• Creating a culture where you feel like you can ask questions.
• Policies alone may not be effective – you need a culture that enables and normalises them.
• Recognising the challenges for managers and people leaders. They need support and need to be equipped to have good conversations. 

Resources Discussed

“The Fix” by Michelle Collins

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.  

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her business in 2019 to put a care wrap around working parents at the hardest time in their career. She is an Executive Coach,  the recipient of the 2022 Jaguar/Viva She Sets the Pace Community Grant, alumni of the 2021 NZ Leadership Programme, and a Swiftie (a lifelong Taylor Swift fan). 

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz 

www.worksforeveryone.co.nz

https://www.instagram.com/worksforeveryone/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-mclean-9176217/

How good is it to spend time with someone who has found her sweet spot and loves her work. This person is indeed, Dellwyn Stuart. Dellwyn is a mother of three and the Chief Executive of the YWCA in Tamaki Makaurau, Auckland. She is in her happy place working with young women in Auckland. Alongside this she is also one of the co-founders of the Mind the Gap campaign (advocating for measuring and reporting on the pay gap in NZ) and created the Women’s Fund, driven from the insight that there was also a gender gap in terms of how much women focused community organisations get funded.  

Our conversation covers:

• Describing what the pay gap (how it is different from equal pay) is and being able to talk about it. 
• Measuring the pay gap helps businesses to work out where women might be thinning out. 
• How your manager’s response to you being pregnant can penalise you right from the start. 
• Taking the negative and flipping it to be positive.
• How we can still be trapped into thinking that Dads need to be the breadwinners but that the younger generation coming through wants it to be different.
• How we can look overseas to see the examples we can follow.
• How employers can start the system change by providing equal pay for parental leave for both parents. 

Resources Discussed

Mind the Gap

https://www.mindthegap.nz/

The Women’s Fund

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/the-auckland-foundation-works-to-establish-a-womens-fund/L6QMIGTF7SNJZ5FDALMTHXUY4I/

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.  

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her business in 2019 to put a care wrap around working parents at the hardest time in their career. She is an ACC certified coach with the International Coaching Federation, the recipient of the 2022 Jaguar/Viva She Sets the Pace Community Grant, alumni of the 2021 NZ Leadership Programme, and a Swiftie (a lifelong Taylor Swift fan). 

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz 

www.worksforeveryone.co.nz

https://www.instagram.com/worksforeveryone/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-mclean-9176217/

This episode is one that I dared to dream about. Through my coaching with working parents, I have had a window on the world of families that others may not have. I have listened to my client’s stories about how they manage the daily operations of their families and the challenges they face. And I have concluded that what happens at home has a massive impact on what is possible at work.

So, I was delighted when Paul and Bec (and 7-week-old baby Aloïse) agreed to be guests on this week’s podcast.  It is a very special conversation where they both very generously talk about their experience of being working parents and how they think about returning to work after having a baby.  Having these kinds of conversations is courageous. And I want to acknowledge this. This stuff is not easy. It is hard and we can do hard things. Speaking of hard things – thank you Paul and Bec for doing this even though you were at peak sleep deprivation!

In the conversation we talk all things:

• Acknowledging that being a mother is the hardest job in the world – it is 24/7. 
• The power of your partner understanding the mental load and expanding their understanding of it. Getting curious. 
• How Paul took the lead on things he could – eg: taking the lead at night so Bec could get more sleep. 
• “Life is not a balance sheet” and why keeping score is not a good idea.
• Work at home is work and needs structure. We don’t need helpers at home, we need owners. 
• Ideas for how partners can support even if they are not home. 
• How the planning ahead is most of the heavy lifting – not the actual doing of the task. 
• Renaming the mental load as strategic planning. Genius!
• Their experience of using the Fair Play cards
• Perception of what each was doing was different. The value is sitting down and talking about it. 
• Communication and why a whiteboard is a foundation of success when you return to work.
• Whether it is “noble” to take parental leave.
• What if we treated parental leave just like annual leave?

Resources Discussed 

Podcast Recommendation - The Imperfects.  

The podcast we discussed is refreshingly honest and courageous, it tells the story of how Penny and Hugh van Cuylenburg The Resilience Project have leant into this hard conversation of the mental load at home and in Hugh’s words ``been the best thing we have done for our relationship”. 

To listen to Hugh and Ryan’s reflections on what it has been like for them was impactful. Honest, at times brutally, and at the same time vulnerable when talking about trying new ways of doing things at home.  It provides a pathway and a way forward to a more equitable home life. Highly recommend it! 

https://open.spotify.com/episode/3CRrKK9Af0QmU4j4GTgW39?si=2eb2f909013840e5

Great for listening in the car.

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.  

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her...

If you have ever wished for a role that has hours that suit the caregiving responsibilities you have, then this episode is for you. 

We interview mother, social entrepreneur and founder of Jobs for Mums, Mela Lush. Mela is on a mission to help parents get work that works for everyone. Jobs for Mums is a social enterprise that connects parents and caregivers with flexible work opportunities in New Zealand. With a deep commitment to driving a movement for family-friendly work aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, Mela is determined to smash the motherhood penalty one job at a time. 

Our conversation covers:

• A business born from the living room and out of the need for family friendly work. 
• How the hidden workforce can solve $80 trillion global skills shortage.
• Why the Motherhood Penalty is the single biggest thing to hit your career. 
• Part time work and how there can be perceptions that those who take this work on are somehow less committed. 
• How it can be common to experience the thought of “I now have a job not a career”.
• Work systems and how jobs were architected were designed 100 years ago and they don’t work for any parent now – we need more innnovation.
• The importance of all parents lifting each other up. 
• Re-thinking how you write job descriptions, whether roles could done with term time contracts, being open to flexibility, thinking about returnships (just like internships but for those that have had a career break) – a way to unlock hidden talent. 
• Being an agitator for change by becoming curious with your employer and asking questions. 

Resources Discussed

Book Recommendation: “The Wife Drought” Annabel Crabb

To contact Mela and find out more about Jobs or Mums please use the links below: 

melalush@jobsformums.co.nz

www.jobsformums.co.nz 

https://www.instagram.com/jobs_for_mums_newzealand/

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.  

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her business in 2019 to put a care wrap around working parents at the hardest time in their career. She is an ACC certified coach with the International Coaching Federation, the recipient of the 2022 Jaguar/Viva She Sets the Pace Community Grant, alumni of the 2021 NZ Leadership Programme, and a Swiftie (a lifelong Taylor Swift fan). 

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz 

www.worksforeveryone.co.nz

https://www.instagram.com/worksforeveryone/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-mclean-9176217/

When we become mothers, we can often be surprised at the changes that it creates in our lives and this episode is a great reminder of that. Tania Domett is an all-round legend and champion of mothers. She is an entrepreneur and as well as running Cogo a research agency she founded 10 years ago she is also a co-founder of Project Gender - a feminist innovation studio delivering radical change through insights research, campaigns, and products and services. Project Gender was recently instrumental in getting a National Women’s Health Strategy into legislation and now policy – after hearing from thousands of women across NZ about their challenges accessing healthcare and partnering with health professionals on a massive campaign.

This episode was recorded before the pre-election policy announcements on paid parental leave (I feel like they must have heard our conversation) - bring it on!

In our conversation, Tania shares her story and her experience of becoming a mother as well as solutions to smashing the motherhood penalty.

• How being a late bloomer is a beautiful thing – Tania’s first office job was at age 38. 
• The joining of forces with Angela Mayer to create Project Gender to bring a gender lens to the 2020 election - You Choose 2020. They advocated for a National Women’s Health Strategy and now it is a formal policy. 
• Saying yes to everything. Putting yourself out there. Even if it means hiding in the loos during networking events. 
• How Motherhood is vastly different from Fatherhood. 
• How a feminist can so easily become a 1950’s housewife when you become a mother.  
• Why smashing the system needs part time roles that are seen as leadership roles and men need to be the targets for flexible working. 
• Measuring the right things to close the gender gap – how many men taking flexible roles, how many men taking parental leave, etc
• How on-site childcare and school holiday programmes help you by not hiding your identity as a working parent.
• How Paid Parental Leave for all parents helps to destabilise the gender norm of women as caregivers and men as providers. We are one of 3 countries in the world that do not have paid partner leave. If we had this – we would dismantle barriers right at the beginning of your family. 
• Hope is not a strategy – action is! 

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.  

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her business in 2019 to put a care wrap around working parents at the hardest time in their career. She is an ACC certified coach with the International Coaching Federation, the recipient of the 2022 Jaguar/Viva She Sets the Pace Community Grant, alumni of the 2021 NZ Leadership Programme, and a Swiftie (a lifelong Taylor Swift fan). 

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz 

www.worksforeveryone.co.nz

https://www.instagram.com/worksforeveryone/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-mclean-9176217/

Haylee Putaranui (Ngāti Maniapoto, Te Aitanga-a-Hauiti, Ngāti Pahauwera) is Fonterra’s Pouhere, Director Māori Strategy. Prior to this she was the Global Lead for Diversity and Inclusion also at Fonterra. Becoming a Mum to Waiaria at 17 provided motivation to move through law school and into practise before joining Fonterra. Outside of mahi, Haylee has contributed to iwi governance roles and led parts of her iwi settlement with the Crown, a process which showed her from adversity and resilience can always come resolution and hope. 

This is episode is extra special and painted in bright colours – which is what you would expect when it comes to the fabulous Haylee. It is a conversation about the leadership we need for not just working parents but for everyone who loves and lives in this land.  Haylee is one of the most generous people you will meet. Generous in spirt, generous in time and generous in wisdom. And it is all shared with a humour that will make you smile. 

We talk all things:

• Sharing other people’s names in rooms that they are not in.
• How success is about how you grow others. 
• The link between foggy glasses and air con units. 
• Why you need to think about when you hold your team meetings.
• How men have so much to gain by smashing this system.
• Being “othered” when you announce your pregnancy
• The importance of asking our people “how are you and how can I support you?”
• Real talk on sleep deprivation.
• Elevating DEI roles so they can have impact.
• Making performance reviews work for working parents.
• And putting a care wrap around parents for 4 years – sign me up!

Resources Discussed

Cindy Gallop – recommended to follow on LinkedIn – “I urge women to not look just for mentors but more importantly to find champions – those people that make shit happen for you”.

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded by Works for Everyone, a business based in NZ and operating globally that supports working parents to stay in the leadership pipeline through coaching, workshops, and advocacy.  

Your host, Emma Mclean, is a mother of three teenagers, an Executive Coach and the Founder of Works for Everyone. Following a successful 25-year career in corporate marketing, Emma launched her business in 2019 to put a care wrap around working parents at the hardest time in their career. She is an ACC certified coach with the International Coaching Federation, the recipient of the 2022 Jaguar/Viva She Sets the Pace Community Grant, alumni of the 2021 NZ Leadership Programme, and a Swiftie (a lifelong Taylor Swift fan). 

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz 

www.worksforeveryone.co.nz

https://www.instagram.com/worksforeveryone/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-mclean-9176217/