I’ve been mulling over the concept of Contributing with Children for a couple of months now. The voluntary or unpaid roles I plan to address in other blogs but here I specifically want to address some early challenges and criticisms of the idea of paid roles where parents could be accompanied by their children.
A brief summary of some benefits of working with your children:
- You don’t have the guilt of trying to be both ‘parent’ and ‘employee’ both your kids and your workplace clearly see you as a multidimensional person
- You have the opportunity to teach your children as you work, modelling for them how to help others and contribute to society, as well as how to deal with stresses and difficulties which arise with being in work
- Your children get to interact with those you help and your co-workers
(most of the above reasons generally apply to both paid and unpaid roles – but obviously a paid role allows more people the opportunity to do it, and also demonstrates an economic and social value)
Why not work in a paid role with children:
(a summary of the main criticisms raised so far with some response comments)
- You get less done! Therefore less pay
Paid employment is essentially done for the money – that’s what differentiates it from all the unpaid work in the world that is done. If it were the cultural norm to take your children to work we may do it and accept the fact that lower pay is a negative consequence, but generally employers value efficiency and employees value being able to make the most amount of money in the time they have available. So children are cared for by someone else whilst their parent works.
With the current government approach to subsidising childcare (at least from 3) it is difficult to make an argument for working with children based on economic principles – unless the government felt that it could get even more parents into tax-revenue-generating employment by offering this as an option.
It would be also very interesting to know how much childcare is currently done by those who are economically inactive or less-active e.g. grandparents or relatives who aren’t in paid employment. As we all expect to work longer in life this becomes less of a legitimate and economically sensible childcare choice – if my own mother, a midwife with 35 years’ experience needs to continue in work and earns more per hour than me, a teacher with 7 years’ experience, it makes more economic sense for me, and not her to take time out. However, I have longer remaining in my career and therefore it is important that I stay involved and continue to develop as a professional.
- Your children will get bored as its not centred around them
As a parent I generally want my child to be engaged, rather than deliberately putting them in a situation they find boring. Children may find a workplace environment interesting for an hour or a morning at a push, but much longer and more regularly may become a struggle for them.
This then creates a further problem – as anyone who has experience with children knows – a bored child will find something to do, and probably the most dangerous, destructive and unhelpful thing which you definitely don’t want them to do!
I have no obvious solution to this – although I wonder how often a child can become bored in their own home and am confident that parents respond to this within the limits of what they can do by providing stimultation or ideas to encourage imagination, a workplace environment will have different limits than a home but it should theoretically be possible a parent adapts their response similarly.
- Some workplaces are not safe for children and insurance policies forbid their presence
This is clearly a huge consideration, and ultimately thinking about the safety of children (and all people) in a workplace is paramount. There are examples of workplaces with extreme risk, and roles such as emergency services workers deal with situations that even an untrained or inexperienced adult would find shocking and possibly traumatising.
But are there others where modifications could be made to accommodate children? It may require a bit more space and the possibility of outdoor working – but surely these adaptions would have benefits also for adults, and may reflect the significant amount of time spent in workplaces as opposed to home environments.
If you did a risk assessment of the average home environment would it pass such a test? Beyond the statutory health and safety regulations and risk assessments I would also affirm that it becomes the responsibility of a parent to assess the immediate environment and take necessary measures to protect their own child, including adapting the environment where possible.
Please do get in touch with any further comments. I am no expert on Health and Safety regulations or insurance, and am a parent with only one, not quite yet mobile child – so I am always looking for specific examples or stories where this may (or may not!) have worked in practice for different parents in different situations.
Contributing with Children 