Making travel guilt free for working women

Here’s an excerpt from an interview with Indira Nooyi, Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo, “When I'm in PepsiCo I travel a lot, and when my kids were tiny, especially my second one, we had strict rules on playing Nintendo. She'd call the office, and she didn't care if I was in China, Japan, India, wherever. She'd call the office, the receptionist would pick up the phone, “Can I speak to my mommy?" Everybody knows if somebody says, 'Can I speak to mommy?' It's my daughter. So she'd say, "Yes, Tyra, what can I do for you?" "I want to play Nintendo."

So she has a set of questions. "Have you finished your homework?" Etc. I say this because that's what it takes. She goes through the questions and she says, "Okay, you can play Nintendo half an hour." Then she leaves me a message. "Tyra called at 5. This is the sequence of questions I went through. I've given her permission." So it's seamless parenting. But if you don't do that, I'm serious, if you don't develop mechanisms with your secretaries, with the extended office, with everybody around you, it cannot work.

For the career driven moms out there, travelling becomes inevitable. Living out of a suitcase can be fun when single but leaving behind wailing kids every time you walk out the door, will definitely fill your days with guilt and eventually impact your concentration and productivity. Here are a few aspects you may consider if you want to make your travel guilt free. 

Build your team at work:

Investing time in upskilling and empowering your team members may seem counterintuitive to a busy schedule, but in the long run, it lightens your load and gives others people the opportunity to be successful. When you can’t delegate, collaborate, only your stress levels will increase.

Don’t fret the small stuff:

Once you realize that you just can do it ALL, it’s important to prioritize. The little time you have at home, do you spend it cleaning and organizing or do you give your kids a piggy back ride.  If you don’t prioritize, you can end up spending a lot of time providing little value, whether to a corporation or to your personal life.

Make kids participate:

Assign kids some household chores. This gives you time to spend with them like grocery shopping over the weekends. This also gives you an opportunity to teach them about finances, inventory, making healthy choices and also gives them an opportunity to share their experiences of the week. Let them do chores alone when the time comes, like laundry.

Fixed schedules:

Always set a fixed time in your busy travel schedule to call in and check on things at home. Sometime mid-day, during lunch breaks, or the goodnight call. Kids will gradually start to expect “that call from mom.” Diarize the itineraries of your kids schedule, co-curricular activities, emergency meds, doctor’s/neighbour’s contacts, outfits, favorite meal plans etc. Juggling things may come naturally to moms, but while away, a detailed schedule helps the other family members and caregivers to minimize the disruption at home.

Flexi Work life:

Structure your work and travel schedule for flexibility. Utilize ‘Comp offs’ after a hectic travel so that you can make up for lost time. Post the travel, ensure you get flexi hours so that you can hang out with kids before work and return early before they go to bed. Many organizations have started ‘work from home’ options too. Infosys has increased ‘work from home’ to 9 days a month. This definitely allows travelling moms to clear major backlog chores at home.

Understanding spouse:

When spouses are equally driven they begin to appreciate each other’s circumstances, take pride in each other’s success and empathize with each other’s challenges. Especially when it comes to travel. Take Marissa Mayer, the CEO of Yahoo, and her husband Zack Bogue, who launched a new VC fund; and Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s COO, who was married to the late David Goldberg, CEO of SurveyMonkey. These partnerships are built on a mutual understanding of the pressures of work and an appreciation for how much the other values his or her career.

Silver lining during travel

Moms who travel on business are faced with many challenges and guilt while on the road. Here are a few silver linings that you can look forward to, while on the road.

1. Appreciate the peace and silence: After mommyhood, moments of silence become rare. Night time excluded as you are far too exhausted to appreciate it then. Business travel is a welcome respite like during the plane ride or ….. 
2. Bed to yourself: Ever wonder how your tiny child can manage to take up the ENTIRE bed? A hotel bed is so…so empty! Break away from curling into the corner of the bed and relish every inch of space.
3. Dining out: Dinners out with your family can be a great way to bond, or they can be screaming, tantrum-inducing, ketchup-in-your-hair exercises. When travelling, you can enjoy real food with real grown-ups indulging in real world discussions.
4. Veg out in front of the tele: Has your pop culture knowledge been limited to Doremon or Ben 10 or Chota Bheem? Business travel is a fabulous way to catch up on Billboard chart busters, soaps, or grown up TV. The kind of programming you used to watch.
5. The chance to miss your kids: Let’s face it. The tantrums and wailing can reach its tipping point. Work travel allows you the chance to be away just long enough to remember how sweet they look when they first wake up. Or, maybe how sweet they look when they’re fast asleep, because at least they’re still quiet then.
6. Travel goodies: Travel in new locations allow you to bring back some great goodies for your loved ones and make them feel missed. It also gives you opportunities to bond over new experiences, photos, videos, hilarious incidents.

So the next time you are handed with a boarding pass, there is a whole lot to think about besides the terminal or the gate you should be boarding. Bon voyage!

By Bonita Fernandes

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