EP. 35 / All Moms Are Working Moms: The Double Shift’s Katherine Goldstein on Blazing Your Own Postpartum Path
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Katherine Goldstein is a journalist who writes on mothers, caregivers and gender equity for The NYTimes, TIME, WashPost, Vox and more… while also raising 3 kids (including pandemic twins!). Hear why Katherine is ready to banish the phrase “working mom” and how her return to journalism after a difficult postpartum experience fueled her next career stage - The Double Shift newsletter & Community.
PLUS Katherine is telling us about what it was like going into the podcast business totally cold and what her biggest struggles were when figuring it all out.
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Show Takeaways:
There’s still a huge bias against mothers in the workplace—especially in the immediate postpartum period
Moving from NYC to Durham, NC after a big career change
Launching a podcast is a little more complicated than it seems—especially if you’re looking to monetize!
Quotes:
On the phrase “working moms”
Yes. I unquestioningly used the phrase working mom for most of my career and even have a tagline of my podcast, a show about a new generation of working moms. And I started to realize over, especially over the course of the pandemic, that I think we need to retire the phrase working moms. Because of course you could say yes, every mother works. Everyone knows that. But I think the delineation between working moms and stay at home, stay at home moms, I'm using air quotes, is a sort of political I is a way of dividing us and seeing our interests as somehow different or at odds. And I think also as we saw during Covid, people go through many phases. We can identify as working moms, but people have taken forced or planned or unplanned breaks from the paid workforce. And that doesn't really change who we are as contributors to the society or that shouldn't have such a big impact on our identity, like our official employment status.
On her difficult postpartum experience and how it changed her career:
“I had increasingly prestigious, increasingly high paid positions throughout my twenties into my early thirties. Then I had my first child and I had a really brutal return to work. Then [I had] a traumatic departure from my job when my son was six months old. I think career shifts are really common when people first become moms but sometimes they're painted as this, ‘Realized what life was truly about and I had this wonderful gentle epiphany into my next thing.’ And mine was not like that at all. I had a really hard first year of my oldest son's life.”
On her eyes opening to rampant workplace sexism after her son was born:
“I was really naive to all sorts of systemic issues that mothers face and how sexism manifests itself in the workplace. Our workplaces are just not set up at all for people with care responsibilities and it was not only dealing with all of the new parent anxieties but also a challenge to my identity as a competent person.”
On launching her podcast:
“I spent a lot of 2018 talking to everyone I knew about podcasting and their experiences in podcasting. I took an audio intensive course to try learn a lot of the technical basics. I was able to connect with someone at a network who was very supportive and teaching me a lot of things, but it was a huge learning curve… I was totally crazy to do it, and if I had known how hard it would be I might not have done it. So maybe it's good that I didn't know how hard it was gonna be.”
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FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Kim Rittberg (00:02):
Katherine Goldstein, creator of the double shift award-winning podcast and community is here. She's talking about her experience, her tough postpartum experience in journalism and how that impacted her entire career. Plus, as an expert on the workplace and moms in the workplace, she has so much insight, so I can't wait for you to hear from her.
(00:23):
This is Mom's exit interview, the show for moms who want to craft the career and life they want. Each episode, you'll meet inspirational moms across various industries and levels who are working and living life on their own terms, and they'll bring you actionable tips from finance to business development to happiness, to crushing that imposter syndrome. I'm Kim Rittberg. I was a burnt out media executive at Netflix, US Weekly and in TV news. I wanted a career where I was fulfilled at work but present at home with my kids. So I started working for myself and I love it, but not every day was easy or is easy. I wanted to explore with all of you how other moms were creating careers on their own terms. They're carving out flex jobs, starting their own businesses. They're taking back control. Join me and make work, work for you instead of the other way around.
(01:27):
Hey everyone, if you hear my voice is a little more hoar than usual, it's because I did some karaoke. I've gotten better about filling my cup. When you have kids, your needs are always put on the back burner. But I recently celebrated my birthday. I was like, we are doing karaoke. Actually, we ended up karaoke, sort of improv improvisationally. We did ax throwing first. Yeah, you take two hands, you put an ax in your hands and you throw it really, really hard at a bullseye on the wall, and it was savage, <laugh>, and really fun. So I think I just did like an unpaid sponsorship for an ax throwing company. Anyway, a client win for me. I always love hearing your wins. Please send in your wins. I love to play them. Client win for me. I've been advising a real estate agent on branding himself so he can go from agent to expert and really be seen as a thought leader.
(02:17):
We strategize and we created an amazing video series really focused on teaching people how to find their home, how to buy their home, all of that stuff. And he just landed a multi-million dollar listing from another agent, referring him that person had seen his content, had seen the social media content that we created together. So that's just a huge win on the power of showing up and building a brand with really focused content. So I'm super excited for him. And if you are a professional or your small business owner and you're looking to find your ideal client and go from professional to thought leader with content, drop me it out. You just hit contact on my website, kim rittberg.com, or you could find me on Instagram.
(03:01):
I am really excited for you to hear from Katherine Goldstein. She's amazing. She's a corporate speaker and consultant for companies looking to better support caregivers at work. She's also a journalist who writes on mothers caregivers and gender equity for some little media outlets like the New York Times, Washington Post Vox and more. She's a 2022 care reporting fellow for the Better Lab at the New America Foundation, and she's a former Harvard Neiman journalism fellow. Wow. Katherine is here sharing her challenging postpartum experience, how hard it was for her as a journalist, returning to work after having a baby, and how that's fueled her next career. Sage. Katherine also tells us about podcasting, the good, the bad, and the ugly side of trying to directly make money off of a podcast. And Katherine talks about how she ended up creating these amazing projects, which is now the Double Shift Newsletter podcast and community. She lives in Durham, North Carolina with her husband and three young children, including pandemic twins. And of course, the best way to start off a podcast is to spill your water all over the floor. I wiped up all my water with a paper towel. I feel like we can start now.
Katherine Goldstein (04:06):
Okay, good.
Kim Rittberg (04:07):
Katherine was interested in social justice and studied sociology in college.
Katherine Goldstein (04:12):
I moved to New York when I was out of college when I was 23 to sort of try to figure out how to make it in the big city as a writer, very classic New York dream. And when I got to New York, I started needed money. So I started doing, I was a, worked as a caterer waitress and a nanny, and
Kim Rittberg (04:36):
I too was a cater waiter. I look great in a bow tie as I'm sure you do,
Katherine Goldstein (04:39):
<laugh>, great gig. And then my big sort of professional break came when I got an interview to work at what was a sort of experimental website called the Huffington Post in 2008, but I was one of the first 50 employees, so my title was blog editor and editor was very loose.
Kim Rittberg (05:02):
That is the most 2008. Yes. Job title ever. Okay.
Katherine Goldstein (05:06):
But I was just completely thrilled for this job and a lot of it involved dealing with angry emails from blog contributors who didn't know how to access their password, and then there'd be people who published directly the site and you'd have to go and clean up all the typos or try to, and then we didn't really have fact checking resources and that became a huge, there was plenty of kerfuffles and scandals over that, and it was very, very early internet
Kim Rittberg (05:32):
On the show, mom's exit interview, we talked to moms about leaving sort of a traditional nine to five. So what made you leave the nine to five and was there an aha moment where you're like, actually, this thing is not working for me. I want to do something different.
Katherine Goldstein (05:47):
I really saw myself as, I felt like I was on this media fast track and I had increasingly prestigious increasingly high paid positions throughout my twenties into my early thirties, and then I had my first child, and I think some of your listeners may not be surprised about where the story goes from here. I had a really brutal return to work and then a traumatic departure from my job when my son was six months old. I think career shifts are really common when people first become moms but sometimes they're painted as this. I realize what life was truly about and I had this wonderful gentle epiphany into my next thing, and mine was not like that at all. I had a really hard first year of my oldest son's life. He was born with health problems. He had two surgeries in his first year, but he was hospitalized twice.
(06:40):
When I was on maternity leave, I was back at work at 12 weeks and completely sleep deprived and traumatized. It was not an easy first year at all, and I then found myself without a job and I was just like, oh, everything. My identity was so wrapped up in my professional success, I felt so lost and I was sort of convinced that everybody has this working mom thing figured out except for me, and I was just a personal failure basically. I just felt like that there was something defective about me if everybody else could make this work except for me, and I was really doing soul searching about what was going to be next for me. And I ended up doing some consulting. And then I think that the most important turning point for me was I then applied for and got a Neiman journalism fellowship, which meant that I got to go spend a year and bring my husband and son, got to spend a year taking classes and being with journalists at Harvard. And it was incredibly transformational for me and probably kept me in journalism in some ways, and that was a really amazing turn of fortune for me. But I definitely didn't have it all figured out and didn't sort of leave the corporate nine to five on voluntary and happy terms.
Kim Rittberg (07:57):
So take me a little bit more back into that time after you had your first son, what that year was like.
Katherine Goldstein (08:04):
Yeah, I mean the thing that is so shocking to me thinking about it is that I feel like as a relatively well-educated person who felt someone who could do their homework and wanted to be prepared for things, I really had no idea what was coming for me. Both the emotional experience of becoming a parent, but how intensive it was and also what the career impacts were going to be for me. And I was a very much an all in on lean in corporate feminist. I thought there was nothing that was going to hold me back as long as I kept charging ahead. I knew sexism existed, but I didn't think it really applied much to me or whatever hurdles had a very supportive partner, it would be nothing that I couldn't handle. And I was just really naive to all sorts of systemic issues that mothers face and how sexism manifests itself in the workplace, like biasing its mothers and also just the way our workplaces are just not set up at all for people with care responsibilities.
(09:17):
And it was definitely, I think a huge, not only just dealing with all of the new parent anxieties, but also the sort of challenge to my identity as a competent person was a huge deal for me or an effective professional, or what am I if I don't have this kind of job with all very, very, very challenging for me? And I think I probably had some amount of undiagnosed postpartum anxiety, and I think I just had a lot of anxiety and hypervigilance about being a new mom and having a kid with some health problems. So it was a very hard year, even though I knew how much I had going for me, I still felt like it was really hard and I felt really isolated and I really felt alone in that experience. And now that I do the work I do now, I realize how common it is and how commonly alone people feel and how people often internalize that these things are their fault. But eventually that experience of the difficulties of that first year I think actually started to fuel me journalistically and I started to look into a lot of these issues from a journalistic perspective, and that ultimately sort of shaped a lot of my path going forward.
Kim Rittberg (10:30):
I came back from mat leave. I mean there were certain things on my mat leave, I had to begged to get blinds put in my office so I could pump. And they were like, oh, you'll just go to this room down the hallway. I was like, I'm leading a 10 person team and I'm trying to be more productive and you're making it really hard. And that was even a tiny, tiny sliver. That's the sort of stuff I saw firsthand. I'm wondering, you know, had mentioned the sexism. What were you seeing firsthand from your experience?
Katherine Goldstein (10:57):
What I've heard so many people experience is that it is really reinventing the wheel in workplaces. Why is this the first time that anyone's having this conversation? Oh, it's because this environment is so difficult that anyone with children has left and therefore has not made it better for anyone. And then everyone just has to continue to reinvent the wheel. And I definitely have heard a lot, huge pain point, and I wonder if this is also going to change now that so many workplaces are hybrid and work from home for some people are going to be working from home from for good. But issues around pumping and scheduling has such a big issue. And part of that is because we don't have adequate family leave. And the sort of feeling of, wait, I thought the second way feminists handled this, why is it like that? It feels like new moms have to just be pioneers every few years. And I think that those are definitely questions that I came away, came away with from my experience and also hear from other moms all the time about,
Kim Rittberg (12:04):
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(13:25):
When your son was around a year, you left full-time media work and that's when you then went to the Harvard Neiman Fellow program. Yes,
Katherine Goldstein (13:33):
So I left my full-time job when he was six months old, and then I did some consulting and then I started at the Neiman when he was a year, and we were there for a year from when he was one to two from 2016 to 2017. And that was a incredibly intellectually formative and personally formative experience and allowed me a lot of opportunity to explore some of these issues that moms face. I first researched it related to newsrooms and then sort of cast a much wider lens to societies in general.
Kim Rittberg (14:04):
That sounds amazing. I mean, whenever someone is paying you to learn and go deep, I mean that's such an amazing opportunity and congratulations.
Katherine Goldstein (14:11):
I still miss it. Yeah, yeah.
Kim Rittberg (14:15):
I like to say I was a finalist for a Fulbright a few years after college. I was so close. So I would love to know then, did you just say, I'm never going back to nine to five, I'm going to figure out a way to pursue journalism, pursue media in my own way that works better for my life?
Katherine Goldstein (14:31):
Yeah, I mean I think media, it also is a particularly volatile and brutal field and there's a lot of time constraints. The 24 hour news cycle has only gotten more intense and worse since I was working in it full-time, came back from the Neiman, we came back to our New York apartment and I was like kind of taking stock and I was the kind of job that I will have to, to maintain this life in New York is just not a job. I'm really willing to do <laugh> anymore. <laugh>,
(15:09):
Right? It wasn't that I wasn't, wouldn't be able to get that job or wouldn't be qualified for that job, but it was that I was no longer willing to do that job. So we actually made some big life changes and we moved to Durham, North Carolina and part of that we have family, my parents in the area, and then my mother-in-law followed us here. But part of that really was just like we want some financial freedom to also be able to pursue some of, I wanted to pursue some of my other interests, my journalistic interests that weren't just about maximizing money. And so I think a lot of people have been faced with these big questions about do I need to live in these expensive places, et cetera, et cetera, through the pandemic.
Kim Rittberg (15:53):
I love that sort of holistic view and I like to say, oh, I was running a unit of 18 people. My job was amazing actually. I really liked it. And then we were acquired and so I realized I don't have control I left. But the truth is it's always more nuanced and digital media, media in general is volatile, but digital media is a storm at sea all the time. And I've seen so many of the most amazing, talented, optimistic, collegial people be laid off with not a moment's notice, no warning, nothing. And it's, it's just not the sort of thing, our parent generation where you work somewhere for 30 years and here's your paper weight and your pension and your 401k, that doesn't exist anymore. And so I think the idea of, I've totally bought out of the idea of loyalty. I was like this whole millennia millennial idea of not having loyalty and just investing in yourself, believing in yourself and bringing on clients. I was like, I'm all in on that <laugh> like so I totally agree with what you're saying just about it's volatile and I like that you're thinking holistically, what sort of life do you want and how do you and your partner want to situate your lives? And it's not just about your work, it's about your work, but it's also about your partner and your kids and your larger family and your community. So I like how you think about it,
Katherine Goldstein (17:06):
But I think it's okay to always be reassessing and thinking you're not going to get eight out of these things. That's just resetting the mindset is really important.
Kim Rittberg (17:18):
You were saying not having it all. I totally agree with you. I mean, I held a lean in book party. We had wine and cheese and crackers. I was like, yes, I not only love this book, it's on my nightstand. I didn't have kids yet.
Katherine Goldstein (17:32):
Oh my God. Same. Maybe we
Kim Rittberg (17:35):
Were in the same book
Katherine Goldstein (17:35):
Group. I know I had a lean in circle and we met and talked about the book in the chapters and none of us had kids and we're just like, this is amazing.
Kim Rittberg (17:46):
Yeah, I was like, she is so right. We could do every single thing. And then finally after I had kids, I was mean in theory. I can technically do all of these things, but I will be so miserable and resentful and not my best self for really either of them that yeah, sure. Can you do this? All of this at a C minus. Okay. In theory, one of the things that I had had, what you were saying about reassessing and what you said earlier about identity is one of the things, and I'd love to your perspective on it, is leaving a sort of prestigious media job. Did you struggle with identity in that?
Katherine Goldstein (18:20):
Yeah, I definitely did. I did the Neiman Fellowship, which was amazing and also prestigious because it was at Harvard and I had that sort of glow of that affiliation. And then out of that I was like, I think I want to start my own podcast about moms, but I want it to be not any other podcast about moms out there and I want to talk about working moms and their stories and experiences and social and economic issues, and people will just look at me. I was nuts.
(18:52):
And then I would go to podcast conferences or whatever and nobody knew me. I was just another lady who said they had a great podcast idea or whatever. And it was definitely a huge, entering a new part of the industry, starting from scratch do and going forward and trying to do my own thing was definitely had to let go and I continue had to have to let go. That of ideas that prestige and affiliations with prestigious organizations or corporate affiliations or institutional affiliations, define your worth or define what it means to do. Define whether or not what you're doing is worthy because someone else has put a stamp on it. And so the podcast as I worked on it, pilot it in 2018 actually had some big media companies that were interested in it and they all passed because people said things they didn't think there was enough.
(19:45):
That was interesting about being a working mom to make an entire podcast about it. I felt like I got a lot of sexist feedback on the show and I was just like wouldn't give up on it. So it was more that it wasn't that I wanted to do it on my own, it was more that I just like, I just was unsuccessful at getting anyone to see my vision. So that sort of propelled me more knowing that I have something unique to say and something different and something I thought was important. And just because people who have credibility or power don't see it doesn't necessarily mean that you're wrong. So I kind of kept with it even when sort of those kind of rubber people who rubber stamp and I, that was very much the way I wanted to go. I wanted a prestigious company to make it produce the show or I wanted to be affiliated with X, Y, Z. And once you realize that a lot of those companies and organizations, they come with their own limitations. And when someone pays you, they own you <laugh>. So that's a part of the lessons and letting go of these sort associations with prestige.
Kim Rittberg (20:58):
And then so tell you launched the double shift. Yes. How did you figure it out? Obviously you were a journalist, but doing this on your own, going into podcasting, how did you figure it all out?
Katherine Goldstein (21:10):
It was such a crash course. I took an audio intensive course to try to learn a lot of just the technical basics. I got some funding and so I was able to hire some people. I got some grant funding, so I was able to hire, but it was a huge learning curve. And I also, I didn't know so much about business. It's like should I be a sole proprietorship or should I be an L L C? I need a tax identification number and I would cry in front of QuickBooks because I couldn't figure out how to do the invoices or whatever. There was a lot of things that I never imagined doing. I think I was totally crazy to do it. And if I had known how hard it would be, I might not have done it. So maybe it's good that <laugh>, I didn't know how hard it was going to be.
Kim Rittberg (21:53):
What do they say? Ignorance. Ignorance is bliss. Yes.
Katherine Goldstein (21:56):
<laugh> those ideas of a non-corporate space for moms that it's much more about envisioning a better future and building communities and social change rather than the micro solutions to personal problems, which I feel like a lot of mom content is aimed at. And so we're trying to do something a little different. So I'm continuing to be entrepreneurial and experimenting, but without the podcast that took up all of my time.
Kim Rittberg (22:22):
How do you envision your income coming in? Is it workshop speeches?
Katherine Goldstein (22:25):
Oh my God. Can you tell me because I feel like my digital, I feel like media is so, I mean think I'm grappling with some really big existential things, which is that I feel that I am a skilled and talented journalist and I think there is not a huge market that is financially lucrative to just be a skilled and talented journalist. I do write for national outlets and I'm able to negotiate what are now considered decent rates, which are tiny fractions of what these kinds of stories used to pay. And so I'm very much figuring that out. So I think writing, I still have some grants that I use for some of the double shift operations that are very small. So I have a small baseline there as part of my overall mission about storytelling and challenging the status quo of motherhood as I'm doing it in different forms. So I have a little bit of grant support, writing the membership community and developing that into things that are like, it starts right now, we're about to raise the price to $7 a month. So it is a very relatively low bar for entry. And
Kim Rittberg (23:38):
I've been thinking more about my chat with Catherine about how we talked about podcasts. And I want to say I agree with Catherine about directly monetizing a podcast is really hard. And many people use podcasts as a content marketing tool so that it helps them get the word out about their business and about themselves. And that's actually something I'm doing with a lot of clients. So as I've grown my own podcast, this very podcast, mom's Exit interview, I've produced for huge companies like People Magazine and help launch an entrepreneur magazine podcast. But for myself, I realize as a solopreneur, a self-employed person, I have to be really conscious of the workflow and create an efficient process. So I'm protecting my time and money because a podcast cannot take up all your time if it's taking up so much of your time, that's time you're not spending on finding new clients, serving your clients, all of that stuff.
(24:25):
So anyway, that's my little spiel. I think podcasts can absolutely grow your business because once you're out there, you're seen as a thought leader and depending on how you structure your show, you can structure it to attract your exact ideal client. There's a lot of ways you can strategically think about doing a podcast so that your ideal client is listening and you're creating that intimate connection with them. And I know a lot of entrepreneurs, my clients and others who see the podcast as an amazing content marketing tool. For some of them it's their best magnet. It is the best way to attract their ideal client. But you have to think about it holistically, how you're structuring it, how much money you're spending on it, how much time you're spending on it. So I think it's been a really, really important thing that if you're a business owner and you're looking to do a podcast or even just as a passion project to really think about it in terms of your whole life, your business goals, your life goals, how much time you have, how much money you have.
(25:19):
Anyway, that's my spiel. I've really been thinking about that a lot and I love my chat with Catherine and we have so much more to talk about now. And speaking of Katherine, I also wanted to say, because Katherine spent several years thinking about researching and talking about moms in America and the workplace on the Double Shift podcast, I wanted her to take on what the landscape looks like, what change we need and what changes she sees happening. Katherine, you spent several years thinking about talking about researching moms in America and the workplace on the double shift. Tell me about what you learned through that process.
Katherine Goldstein (25:55):
Oh man, I have dozens of hours of Perfect
Kim Rittberg (26:00):
A, we'll do a marathon. It'll be a marathon session
Katherine Goldstein (26:03):
Of what I've learned. But I mean think that the biggest thing that I learned over and over is one, people's personal stories are really important, and we don't hear nuanced diverse stories about mothers in America in a way that gives them the journalistic treatment they deserve and gives them a voice. Sometimes we just hear it feel like we hear the same stories over and over. And I've really learned that those really do impact people and people learn from them. And that's really important. And I think the next thing I would say is just that so much of what is difficult about being a mother in America is framed as a personal problem and something that we need personal solutions for an app, a morning routine, the perfect childcare provider is going to sort of fix it when we're facing huge systemic obstacles. And the more that we tune into those systemic obstacles and realize this isn't about personal failure, I think the more we can make positive social change and we should be thinking about motherhood as a form of activism and resistance and way to push society for a more just world rather than just surviving and life hacks and trying to just make it through the day.
(27:17):
Because sometimes it feels like all we can do is make it through the day, but I think there can be a much bigger conversation. And that's really important to look at the global and the systemic and the country level problems we're facing.
Kim Rittberg (27:30):
What specifically is our workplace culture not doing if we were to get together and make the change, what are the top things you think need to be changed?
Katherine Goldstein (27:38):
So workplaces in America, for the most part, and of course there are new conversations that are happening in the covid post covid world, which I think are long overdue, but for the most part they've been set up so that are based on a 1950s style family. The idea that there is a breadwinner who goes into work and can have their undivided attention from nine to five on their job. They can be in a physical place and there's someone else at home who's taking care of all the caregiving. And that is not the way our economy works, that's not the way families work. And our workplaces have been very, very slow to catch up to that. And that I think has hindered all sorts of progress for women and especially mothers and just hindered our society as a whole. Women graduate from college at higher levels.
(28:28):
We are more accomplished professionals and then are often held back from reaching leadership positions and contributing the most possible to our fields because of these rigidities of systems. So I would say that is a baseline, and I think we've, we put way too much emphasis on FaceTime and thinking about people working in traditional ways rather than seeing, wanting to support people in all aspects of their caregiving lives. Because whether or not you have children, everybody's going to have need care or give care at some point in their lives. And so not recognizing that human reality I think actually hurts businesses or is a huge problem in how our workplaces are structured.
Kim Rittberg (29:18):
And so what sort of things would you advocate? So is that more flexible, more hybrid work from more work from home, which obviously we're seeing since the pandemic, we're seeing a little more of that. Is it more flexible leave, which is not just if you even get 12 weeks. I actually didn't get 12 weeks. I got the first time, I wasn't there for a year, so I got the New York state and the second time my leave, which was six weeks, eight weeks, got cut to three weeks. So I would've had three weeks of paid leave, which would've left me in those huge purple stretchy underwear from the hospital. And not to be gross, but bleeding out in the office anyway. What are the things that you think that companies or government should be pushing for?
Katherine Goldstein (30:01):
You cannot be a company that supports women or claim to have women's best interests at a heart if you do not offer a fully comprehensive parental leave policy. And I would add on to parental leave, family leave policy overall. So I've seen really actually amazing great examples of women, mostly women who have advocated and got much better family leave policies at their offices going from six weeks to 24 weeks or things like that. And a lot of that has to do with getting groups of women together and advocating and saying, this is something that people really want. It's not just a one person squeaky wheel situation. And usually there's a great business case for it, why? It helps you be more competitive, retain talent, have to spend less on hiring and replacement and training and all this stuff. So I would say not only do you not just need the bare 12 weeks, which is a made up number that has no medical, it is not related to anything medical.
(31:01):
This is literally a political compromise number made up in 1993. It's not actually related to what women need. So research is generally says between four and six months is how long parental leave should be. I think there should be a gender neutral option. And creating a culture where men are encouraged to not only have but take their full parental leave, it's the most feminist thing a man can do is to take their full parental leave. And that will have a tremendously positive impact on both the family because men are more involved in their kids' lives when they do that, but also on the workplace because it reduces unconscious bias that women are going to be more likely to be out. It makes men more empathetic to mothers in the workplace. So that's the baseline if you have not done that at a company yet, that is sort of target number one. And I think now thinking about it more comprehensively about caring for elderly family members or life is hard. Sometimes you have a kid who is sick for who's not a baby, who you need to be there for or a spouse. We need to be thinking about these things comprehensively and not just like, oh, we want to give a perk to moms.
Kim Rittberg (32:07):
Yeah, it's interesting, the thing about the gender neutral, seeing just anecdotally more dads taking leave recently in the past few years, which so many people say the title of your podcast and your newsletter and your project is the double shift in some of it is that women, when you're trying to lean in at work, but you're always leaning in at home, there is no not lean in at home. And so the more men are, there's no stigma. You're taking away the stigma of an involved dad instead of yay you to your kid's soccer game. You're so amazing. And rather you're both parents. These are normal things that both parents do. So I mean the idea that America and capitalism in our economy, it really wants to keep those working women. Women are graduating at higher rates in college and they're more of them are going to master's degrees as well.
(32:56):
But in theory, companies want to keep them. But like you mentioned before, it's really not set up when we say nine to five, like I say, nine to five on the show, just for simplicity, it's really like nine to seven and you're phone buzzing all weekend. So when you have two parents and you're lucky if you are in some sort of job where you're not even in all the time working double shifts or whatever, working literally back to back shifts. But I just think it's, it's hard. It's hard to have two parents both really grinding and trying to do that. I think all these things need to happen. And I also think that how we say, oh, we want to keep women in the workforce. We think it's so good for society, but society's not making it good for them. I love that idea. And I think to your point about demanding change, one of the things I've thought about and I talked about with a workplace expert is a lot of times parents are sort of quiet about what time they leave.
(33:51):
They sneak out. And I don't think, listen, I'm not one of those people who's like, it's your job to do X. I'm like, Ugh, it was my job to lean in and then I was a mom. And I'm like, no, it's not. I think it's your job to do whatever you can do to get by. Life is short, you should live your life how you want to live your life. But I think that realistically when parents are sneaking out because they feel judged, because they're being judged, but not being clear that I leave every single day at five 15, that's just how it goes. It's not normalizing for all the other parents. I remember before I had kids, everybody would give side eye to the parents, you're clocking out at five 15 because you're young and you're like, I'm going to stay till six or six 30 or seven or whatever.
(34:30):
But the truth is they do have kids and they want to see their kids. They had kids so they can be with their kids for dinner or bedtime or whatever. But I think there's that idea you were seeing a banding together of what you are getting, be open about it. And one of the other things I'm focusing on for the podcast is part-time jobs. The more I started thinking about that, to your point, I started finding other moms who had gotten part-time jobs, but it's under the radar. I hired a part-time worker. I didn't even realize I had to hire up really fast for Facebook Live. This is when they were paying everyone money to do live content. I had to hire super fast. And a mom came in and I knew of her. She had very good work, and she's like, I can only work three days a week, but I have someone who could fill in the other two days.
(35:15):
And I was like, you just solved my problem. No problem. Yeah, great. Come on in. And I didn't realize I was doing that. And then when I started consulting, someone wanted to hire me and I was like, oh, I'd love to work with you. You seem amazing, but I'm only able to work three days a week. And they were like, are you sure? And I said, I'm a thousand percent sure. And it still happens. So you have to be so clear in what your needs are and it's not going to work all the time. But you don't realize that when you believe strongly in what you need and what you want, and then you ask for it, you just don't know what's the worst. They say, I won't give you three day, three days a week, but I'll give you four or I won't give you four days a week, but I'll let you work from home Friday. So I think that people are afraid to ask, but the truth is don't ask get. I wanted to talk to you about the phrase working mom. Yes. And what your thoughts are around it. I read a really interesting article that you wrote, so I'm forcing you to talk about it now.
Katherine Goldstein (36:02):
Yes. I unquestioningly used the phrase working mom for most of my career and even have a tagline of my podcast, a show about a new generation of working moms. And I started to realize over, especially over the course of the pandemic, that I think we need to retire the phrase working moms. Because of course you could say yes, every mother works. Everyone knows that. But I think the delineation between working moms and stay at home, stay at home moms, I'm using air quotes, is a sort of political I is a way of dividing us and seeing our interests as somehow different or at odds. And I think also as we saw during Covid, people go through many phases. We can identify as working moms, but people have taken forced or planned or unplanned breaks from the paid workforce. And that doesn't really change who we are as contributor to the society or that shouldn't have such a big impact on our identity, like our official employment status.
(37:05):
So I do think that mothers in the workplace, in the paid workplace do have some unique challenges. And I think we should talk about those. But the idea, I think it has all been very, very clear that all mothering and all caregiving is work, and it is highly unvalued in our society and devalued. And so to say one person, one person who earns money and has the blessing of capitalism is working and one person who is doing so much but is not paid for that work is not working to me, just doesn't sit right politically anymore. So I now use the phrase mothers in the paid workforce, workforce moms, paycheck, moms employed moms. Because I just feel like it's important to not say, if you are not working for pay, you are not working.
Kim Rittberg (37:55):
One of the other things I found really interesting in that article from you is how structurally society, we all know marriage is a construct. We're monogamous. We married people because it creates a home for children. That's like the point of it. So we sort of understand that, but I didn't really think about the idea of how we value women in the marriage construct and that, can you tell me a little bit more about that? Because that, I thought that was really interesting in the article that getting married and starting the household was a partnership.
Katherine Goldstein (38:24):
Yeah. I think until relatively recently, the idea of a housewife was a job, the job of running the household that was a very important economic partner. And that men themselves could not thrive without this equally important economic partner. The man would be working in the fields or in the blacksmith shop or in as a merchant or a laborer, whatever. But the person who ran the house was in sort of equal economic partner. And it's really only actually until the 20th century that we start to see that as seen as a denigration and that real work in real careers are outside the home and everything that happens inside the home doesn't really have much value. So that's a sort of unintended consequence I think of some of the feminist framing of the 20th century is devaluing that. Of course, I don't think that should be women's only option or that, but I think the idea that that was considered an important economic contributor has been lost in our 20th and 21st century views on these issues.
Kim Rittberg (39:36):
You can check out the double shift.com, which has all of the links to read Katherine's work and join their newsletter and community.
(39:46):
Thank you so much for listening. Make sure to drop a review, and if you want to send in a real mom moment that will share on the air, check out moms exit interview.com. And if you're a professional or small business owner looking to grow your brand through amazing content with no silly dances and with no burnout, check out my website, Kim Rittberg dot com and you can hit contact to chat with me. And thanks for listening. Like this is the most amazing community. You guys send in the best feedback. So share it with your friends. Let anyone know who you think would appreciate it. And this is Mom's Exit interview. I'm your host and executive producer, Kim Rittberg. The show is produced by Henry Street Media. Jillian Grover edited this episode, and Aliza Friedlander is our editorial producer and publicist. I'll see you next time.