Attorney Authored
Make It Work: Ten Tips for Navigating Partnership and Motherhood
September 28, 2010
BY Elizabeth Noe, Cheryl Saban and Rita Srivastava
When we asked women partners at our firm whether great partners can also be great mothers, we heard a resounding, “_It’s difficult, but worth it!”_
We interviewed 20 Paul Hastings women partners with children (“partner-mothers”) about how they manage partnership and motherhood. These 20 partner-mothers work in 11 offices in the U.S., Asia, and Europe. They have been partners from three months to 30 years. They are litigators, transactional lawyers and counselors. Their children range from newborns to newlyweds. They gave birth or adopted when junior associates, just before making partner, and several years after making partner. Some are raising their children as single mothers and others are raising their children with significant others, from stay-at-home caretakers to investment bankers to senior executives.
Our partners-mothers reported struggling with common issues regarding navigating partnership and motherhood: How will I be able to spend enough quality time with my child? How can I be available 24/7 for my children and my clients? How can I give clients my all? How will I find time for business development? How can I travel for trials or deals, and still be there for my children? How can I avoid missing out on too much at work or at home? They also reported using remarkably similar tools to navigating partnership and motherhood.
We walked away with the following ten helpful hints about how to make it work..