LinkedIn celebrates Mother's Day with working moms

Multiple working moms took to LinkedIn to talk about their journeys, joys, personal experiences and challenges this Mother's Day.

The blurring lines between ‘Work from Home’ and ‘Work at Home’ is presenting new challenges to the Indian professional workforce, as remote working is swiftly becoming the new normal. Working moms in India are one of the hardest-hit professional communities in the wake of COVID-19, as they suddenly find themselves trying to finish complex work tasks, home-schooling their children, and fulfilling house responsibilities - all at once.

This Mother’s Day, LinkedIn celebrated the rigour of Indian working moms by sharing key insights into the barriers they face, and learnings from powerful Indian women voices on how they have overcome these barriers. LinkedIn hosted a discussion on the platform to put a spotlight on Working Mothers to spark a positive discussion around women who balance work and parenthood, overcoming challenges, how to best support them in the workforce, and share their learnings and solutions with the members.

Influential working mothers on LinkedIn such as Vani Kola, Neha Bagaria, Naiyya Saggi, Tara Sharma came forward to engage and share their personal incidents of when they had to overcome a barrier at the workplace as a working mom and where they feel they need more support.

Blogs by moms

Some of the blogs and videos published by working moms on Linkedin on the occasion of Mother's Day include:

• Ansoo Gupta shared a video showing support to all the working mothers with a special mention for doing a great job
• Divya Kohli, Senior HR Business Partner at Nestlé wrote a piece on Honest attempt to have it all as a Working
• Tara Sharma Saluja, Actor and Conceptualizer, Presenter & Co-producer of The Tara Sharma Show posted a video on lack of confidence among working moms and how to overcome it
• Deepali Naair, CMO India & South Asia, IBM posted a video on work-life balance conundrum that most working mothers face
• Neha Bagaria, Founder & CEO, JobsForHer shared a video with five tips on how mothers can stay focused and productive at home during the lockdown
• Apurva Purohit, President - Jagran Prakashan Ltd. shared a video message on her experiences juggling between home affairs and work responsibilities
• Abhijit Bhaduri, Founder, Abhijit Bhaduri & Associates shared a video message on offering equal opportunity for working mothers at home
• Vani Kola, Managing Director, Kalaakari penned an article on This Mother's Day, Can We Talk About Self-Care?
• Anjali Gulati, Founder & CEO at People Konnect & Back to the Front –posted on how the pandemic has changed lives of Working Moms in more ways than one, sharing her article titled: ‘Has the lockdown added pressure to #WorkingMothers’ lives?’
• Neerja Birla, Founder & Chairperson at Aditya Birla Education Trust posted a video message sharing her personal experience trying to balance work and home
• Naiyya Saggi, Founder, BabyChakra, in a video message shared her journey as a mompreneur
• Ruchita Dar Shah, Founder and CEO, First Moms Club, in her article titled #WorkingMothers have to learn to manage their guilt! highlighted the importance of prioritizing and finding the right balance
• Ruchee Anand, Director – Head of Talent and Learning Solutions at LinkedIn, wrote an article — Take it easy, (Working) Mom!
• Srividya G., Director, Brand and Consumer Marketing, Asia Pacific & China at LinkedIn – Article titled ‘Making this work as Mom’

Also Read: Mothers Day Campaigns 2020 tell stories that need to be told

Opportunity Index survey

As part of the LinkedIn Opportunity Index 2020, LinkedIn looked at what opportunity means to people, and what are the barriers they feel in achieving this opportunity. One such group surveyed included working mothers. An interesting take away from the findings show that Indian working mothers face a lot of barriers to getting ahead in life, but at the same time, they are also optimistic about overcoming these barriers in comparison to Indian working fathers.

Working moms say lack of confidence, gender, and family commitments are key barriers

• Working mothers across APAC think financial status, age, lack of time, lack of networking and connections, and a difficult job market are the top 5 opportunity barriers they face. 
• More working mothers in India cite education background, gender, and lack of confidence as the top 3 barriers that hold them back. Working mothers are nearly 30% more likely to think ‘lack of confidence’ stops them from achieving opportunities when compared to working fathers in India. 
• Nearly double the number of working mothers cite ‘gender’ as a key barrier, in comparison to working fathers and men.
• Family commitments, lack of support, travel-related challenges, and unable to keep up with technology changes daunt working moms across APAC. Findings also show that working mothers are 35% more likely to face a lack of support and family commitment than working fathers in APAC. 

Working moms look for jobs with work-life balance

• Working moms seem to continue to look for a fulfilling career path that helps them juggle various responsibilities. They are more likely to be actively searching for a rewarding job, a new career path, and a job that offers them good work-life balance. 
• LinkedIn research shows that working mothers are almost 20% more likely to look for a job that offers them good balance when compared to men in APAC. 

Working moms are MORE optimistic, motivated about overcoming barriers

• In spite of the challenges, Indian working moms are more optimistic about overcoming barriers in comparison to Indian working dads. 
• Working mothers are more likely to pursue the ability to change to a new career path, than all females and all males in APAC, and are more likely to move to a rewarding job/career than all females in APAC
• In India, fewer working mothers (15.9%) think ‘lack of motivation’ is a difficult barrier to overcome, when compared to working fathers (20%), women (22.2%) and men (29.5%)
• In India, fewer working mothers think ‘lack of networking’ is a difficult barrier to overcome, when compared to working fathers and men