The Mom Economy:
The Mothers' Guide to Getting Family-Friendly Work
By Elizabeth Wilcox
(Berkley, 2003)

Excerpt from The Introduction
It was a winter's noon, snow like a white duvet encasing a daughter's school. Claire pulled into the preschool lot early, unfurling a morning newspaper from a mud-drenched bag. Four months ago, Claire had quit her job so she could spend more time with her two daughters, ages four and six. To help pay her bills, Claire had recently secured two freelance projects that drew on her sales and marketing experience with women’s magazines. Now, she worked mornings, evenings, and whenever else her self-employed husband could oversee the kids. As she had in the past, Claire would soon change her work situation, increasing her time commitment at work so she could meet more pressing financial and professional needs. In fact, a year later she had, turning one of her client’s projects into full-time, flexible-hour work. A year after that, her work had changed again. But for now, she was an at-home worker and mom, squeezing precious minutes from an early arrival at school.

As she got out of her car, I spoke to her about this book. It wasn’t a new topic for her. Several months before, I had mentioned this book in passing as we had unbundled our children at school. "I’ve spent my life in magazines," Claire had commented in response. "I know a lot of people. Bear me in mind if you want help." Throughout the following months, Claire would occasionally touch base with me, asking how the book was progressing, leaving a message on my answering machine if a relevant newspaper article caught her eye. She became a pivotal force in the early stages of my book, inspiring me to press ahead, alerting me to conferences on issues affecting working women, passing me a contact that she thought could help. She seemed to believe in her heart, even before I outlined to her my book, that the mom in the big, blue van with the three small kids was just as likely to have a good idea as the man in the black suit. If women are estimated to control about 80% of household spending, why wouldn’t they know what kind of Volvo would sell or a good book idea?

The women in this book
Claire is one of many women in this book whose insights and support form the foundation of this book. She, like many others, is a valuable contributor to this book both in terms of the insights she provides and the experiences she recounts. Of course, each of these women’s stories is, in some ways, unique. Claire, for example, has held approximately 12 jobs in 20 years, each move precipitated by one of a long list of personal reasons - a sick father, a newborn, a husband launching a home-based business, financial concerns, and a child entering elementary school. But their stories are in some ways very similar too. Those similarities are what this book is all about.

These women are not alone. The women in this book- and perhaps you as well - inhabit a sphere whose numbers grow daily. They are part of a large number of American women who are changing traditional perceptions of what path a career should look like, who give credence to one executive career coach’s adage that "a woman’s career is like a patchwork quilt, a man’s a vertical line". They are part of the millions of women who now comprise some 46% of the U.S. labor force. They are part of the more than two-thirds of moms between with children under 18 years old who now work,but like the more than 40% of married women with children under one may have taken some time out from the workforce to care for their kids. Many of them are among the one-third of women who will work part-time at some point in their career, primarily to care for kids.Some are also among those women who account for some 28% of privately held firms in the U.S. and are now starting businesses at more than twice the rate of men.These women may work part-time, full-time, flexible hours, shared jobs, from home, or in their own businesses. They, like women as a whole, may change jobs more frequently than men. But they have one common objective among them – to create a working life that supports children.

These women are, in short, members of the Mom Economy – a growing number of women with one foot in the workplace and one foot at home. And that’s how they feel they should live. They cannot be defined by one term: "working" or "stay-at-home", though we women strive so hard to put each other there. Some of these women have been stay-at-home moms and some have worked for pay their entire adult life. Some stand somewhere in between, moving in and out of the workforce as needs demand. And many cannot define their career under one single term. Ask Claire, for example, what she does for a living, and advertising, sales, marketing, research, magazines, publishing, all feature somewhere in her response. For to get family-friendly work, women often have to think laterally in their search, refusing to pinhole themselves into one type of job for one single company for their entire career.

The women in this book achieve something that a good number of mothers want. Many of them change jobs without burning bridges; take less senior jobs but command good salaries; step out of the workforce and then receive offers to return. Ask how Claire does it and her language is peppered with sound bytes that a career coach might provide. "I am a specialist and a generalist…My contacts are my friends… I jump in and hit the ground running…I come in and know what they’re doing…I’m willing to take jobs more junior to me. I say: ‘Maybe I can move things forward.’ " It is by understanding their strategies that you can begin to understand how to do the same...

Buy This Book

"A treasure trove of sophisticated insights
into crucial specifics
of job finding such as
benefit packages,
negotiating
strategies, and
networking approaches."
- Elizabeth Berger, M.D.
Author, Raising Children With Character

"This is an essential guide for all working mothers."  Lillian Vernon, Chairman/CEO, Lillian Vernon Corporation