I am a working mom. It’s 10:30AM. I just put my son down for his first nap of the day. It’s actually late for a morning nap…rather than the usual 7AM, he decided to sleep in until 8:30 this morning. His daily schedule is flexible like that—he’s in charge. And that’s okay. Because my job allows for that kind of flexibility.
When he naps, I work. I am part of the growing workforce of work-from-home moms, largely made possible by the new popularity of social media. At DC Interactive Group, for many clients we provide a virtual online marketing department. We consider ourselves part of our client’s team—but we happen to be experts at our focus area, and we happen to work off-site.
When I was 4 months pregnant, my husband and I gave our working plan a lot of thought. And from just a cost perspective, when we factored the cost of daycare, reducing my hours to part time and working from home was the perfect scenario. Fortunately, the boss was on board—he’s a family man himself, but he also gets it—because our focus is promoting your business in online circles, we can take care of that from anywhere.
And he’s not the only employer taking advantage of the unique skills moms have to offer the online world—check out MomForce.com , an entire site dedicated to placing moms in just this sort of position. The job placement site offers flexible jobs, some entirely telecommute, some with some hours at home, some with all hours on site, and many jobs in the social media arena, including jobs categorized as blogging and social media jobs. It also gives moms the chance to post their resumes and skills for employers to review.
When I was a kid and people asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?", I never would have answered, "A blogger." (Considering the world wide web wasn’t quite invented until I was around 10, that would have been an odd answer…stranger than my usual answer, "A turtle.") But now, blogging can be a career. In fact, Alecia Keys just announced a job listing she posted on Monster for a "Head Blogger" , and she teamed up with Monster, who will use their 6Sense search technology to find the right candidate.
Blogging for clients is a big part of what I do. A lot of times I enjoy myself so much that I think, I couldn’t possibly be getting a paycheck for this. And it isn’t that bad of a deal for employers, either. When I sit down to work, I work. I hate to admit it, but the hours I record are among the most productive work hours of my life. When Wally Ben is napping, I am approaching each task with a focus unmatched in my days of sitting at the same desk from 9-5.
So hooray to the social media world for opening up a new work alternative for moms. And hooray to the employers out there who see how that alternative can work for both moms and their businesses. It will be interesting to see how social media continues to change the way we work. It’s exciting to be a part of a new, developing arena that plays such a big part in people’s lives.
Now I’m off to change another diap, and while I’m at it, I’ll ask Wally Ben what he wants to be when he grows up. Hopefully he’ll come up with something a little less reptile than his mom’s childhood dream.