Just before I sat down to write this column, I wrapped up a quick phone call with a colleague. There were delighted shrieks in the background; apparently his toddler had just seized a crowbar. Such is the new background music of work-from-home life.
Even if parts of the economy soon reopen, many schools, summer camps and day-care centers have decided to remain closed until autumn. And epidemiologists are warning that we may need rolling, intermittent shutdowns to cope with new outbreaks. That means working parents operating in just-get-through-today conditions will have to shift into a more sustainable mode — as will their bosses, who may, of course, be working parents themselves.
To get through the next weeks, months or (gulp) years with even a modicum of grace, we have to start with open communication. This is obvious, yet necessary conversations often don’t happen. Working parents get subtle (and overt) signals that they should excise their families from their professional lives, which stops such talks before they start. And managers are often afraid to pry into employees’ personal lives, or are discouraged by HR from asking sensitive questions.