Balancing career and family life is a real juggling act: Three successful working mums share their prized advice.
Balancing career and family life is a real juggling act: Three successful working mums share their prized advice.
Founder, Klarity Skincare & Secretive
“Stay healthy so you have more quality time with your children”
Karine took an unconventional path towards motherhood; she fell pregnant and got married at 18. After giving birth at 19, she continued working full-time. Now a mum to Raeann, 12, and Jaedon, nine, Karine owns three businesses, including Singapore’s first halal-certified skincare brand, Klarity Skincare, and skincare distribution company Secretive. Karine reveals how she manages her career and her kids.
Get your priorities straight “Prioritise and define what is more important to you. I had a more balanced work life when I understood that once I missed out on my children’s developmental stages, I couldn’t turn back time. But if I missed the opportunity to make money, I could always make it the next time.
“Never neglect yourself, no matter how busy you are. Staying healthy means you have more quality time with your children. Love yourself and eat a balanced diet, exercise, and practise a good skincare regime.”
Find support through friends, family or a helper “It was tough being a mum at first, but my parents patiently guided me through it. I also engaged a domestic helper who was an experienced motherofone: This helped me manage my children quite well. I would also gather for meals with my close friends, and they helped take care of my baby!”
Think positive, and the rest will follow “When I ventured into my beauty business, it was challenging; at times, I would have to stay late at work packing goods for deliveries. Still, my children gave me so much joy, with their smiles and hugs: I felt like my life was meaningful and full of purpose. Always tell yourself: ‘You can do it!’ You will attract positivity if you stay positive.”
“Working mothers should always take time out for themselves”
As CEO of wellness travel portal Om & Away and mum to Ava, aged six, and Mya, four, Charlyn jokes she’s still looking for that magic work-life balance. “I took a nine-month sabbatical after giving birth to Ava, and I’ve been working ever since,” she says. After leaving her banking job, she set up businesses in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, including Om & Away. This is how the entrepreneur mum finds time for her family, work and herself.
Learn to manage “mum guilt” “The most difficult challenge for working mothers is the guilt of not spending enough time with your kids, and missing out on their precious moments. It was hard to leave Ava to go to work when she was only nine months old; I felt so horrid leaving her at home. I set up IP cameras all over my home and watched them at work on my phone. I attended ‘baby and mama’ classes with Ava, and would spend every waking moment outside of work with her.
“When Mya arrived it was somewhat easier, but I still felt guilty. So I made up for it by breastfeeding her longer – for about 14 months, a couple of months longer than her sister. By then, I was able to manage my emotions of guilt and separation much better. It does get easier over time. Before I was a mother, I was more ‘self-centric’, and afterwards, I was more ‘others-centric’, especially towards my precious little babies!”
Have clear boundaries between “work time” and “mum time” “As an entrepreneur, you work all the time, but I try to carve out time where I concentrate on work and hold meetings, when they are in school or at classes. On the other side of the coin,v I have ‘mum time’ with them during our bedtime ritual, where I am entirely theirs. I put my phone away and we tell stories, play, pray and sing together, and fall asleep holding hands!
“For mums who worry about not spending enough time with your children, find or create an activity to do with them that is unique only to you. They’ll associate good feelings with that activity and you, and look forward to that quality time. For my daughters and me, it’s our special bedtime routine, and baking together.”
Founder and CEO, Om & Away
“A busy work life should not take you away from your child”
Sue Kyung is a trailblazer. She rose through the ranks to become country CEO of P&G Korea while raising her son Ryan, now aged 25. Now based in P&G Singapore, Sue Kyung shares her admirable journey of how she juggled work and parenting to achieve her career dreams, and how she’s inspiring the next generation of women, too.
Be true to yourself, not what society expects of you “As a young Korean woman in my 20s, many people expected me to stay home and tend to my in-laws and husband. Yet, though I was a wife, I still dreamed of forging a successful career. I returned to the work force after graduating from my MBA course, a year after Ryan was born, and pushed myself beyond my comfort zone in P&G, where I have been for the past two decades.”
Find a work environment and community that supports mothers “When I returned to work after having Ryan, I spent almost my entire month’s salary hiring a nanny to look after him. I had to rush home every evening to relieve my nanny’s duties; I could not clock in the extra hours I wanted to because I had a young son at home.
“I’m now P&G APAC’s Diversity & Inclusion program sponsor, and we have a robust internal women empowerment program to help keep women in the workforce. Mentors like myself are active members of our Lean In Circles, where we groom our female employees to grow in their careers together.”
Make your children part of your work life “A busy work life should not take you away from being there for your child. From a young age, I’ve brought Ryan to commercial shoots with me, and invited him for lunch with me every day when he was in middle school.
Sue Kyung Lee, 52
Vice President of Global Safeguard and Asia Pacific, Skin & Personal Cleansing, Procter & Gamble (P&G)
