Can Women Have It All?

While interviewing Indra K. Nooyi, the CEO of PepsiCo, David Bradley, from The Atlantic, asked two questions that elicited frank discussion on work-life balance. If you haven’t read about it, check it out here.

We asked for opinions on the topic from the SHEROES community – what would you do if your mom asked you to get milk at 10:00 PM when you want to announce good NEWS and women having it all. Here is what we got in replies-

What the women think-

There are two sides to the story – first is from the point of view of the mother of the CEO - It is just plain and forthright. After all we breathe the same air, drink the same water and walk on the same earth no matter how people perceive you. The bond between parents and children is real and unconditional. It is all about being grounded and accepting the chide.

And In the shoes of a working mother - Yes, you are bound to get pangs of guilt when you are away from your children for long hours and leave them in secondary care. But you have to rethink and ask yourself what is it you are doing for? What you cumulate by doing today is going to be reaped by none other than your progeny - the rightful harbingers who hold you high and feel proud of what you did. This feeling is a sufficient fuel for you to progress in your career.

Savitha Ravikiran

Yes, we can't have it all. But then why expect us to have it all and to do it all? Expectation to 'have it all' / 'be perfect in every role' come from husbands, parents, in-laws, kids, society at large and mostly Ourselves!!! I feel it is the expectation from ourselves that brings on the guilt in maximum cases. 

Homemaker has been synonymous to women over the centuries and women with great careers outside home are also always expected to have 'Home' and related responsibilities as the first priority. 

Why can't I choose to be perfect in one role and just live the other roles as good as I can without being judged and looked down upon? And why can't that one role be that of a 'Career woman'?

Payal Goyal Bajaj

A Man’s perspective-

Life is all about making right choices and getting along with them rightfully in its full earnest. No matter how right the choices might be, it will not be welcomed by a few. Those few can be our loved and dear ones or distant relatives of ours or some unknown fans and followers on social media. The case of Indira Nooyi is no different as she chose to be the president rather than a typical wife, mother, daughter or so on. I don’t see a reason that she should feel guilt about it as she can’t undo the done. What she can carry forward is the fact that she has achieved something which most women would find hard to imagine. She was not born to carry milk or for that matter play ‘Nintendo’ with her kids. There are a number of male CXOs who have caring and supportive wives to both carry the milk and feed them to their children. There were many others who didn’t even bother what their family did or even existed. So, Indira Nooyi finds herself in a situation where she didn’t have a husband who could have carried milk or even if he did it still made her feel guilty. This guilt is so epidemic that it has impacted the lives of a majority of the working women who always take a half-hearted attempt at their career and most of them make it second to their primary job of ‘carrying’ milk. Most of us would never disrupt the balance between our professional life and family life. And for that matter, Most of us would never come even close to watch Ms. Indira Nooyi achieved.

As I said, Life is all about making right choices and once you do you never regret and never crib about it. You can be a happy mother feeding your kids, playing with them and cleaning their mess. You can be a strict leader accomplishing tasks with your male counterparts at odd hours of day away from home and kids. You can be a super-mom managing both of them equally well. But at the end of the day, you win some you lose some. The Choice is yours and it should come with zero regret and no guilt.

Vivek Kumar