E17: Just Because I Don’t Have Kids Doesn’t Mean I’m Always Available

"Just Because I Don’t Have Kids Doesn’t Mean I’m Always Available"

[00:00:00] Erika Bergen: Today we're talking about boundaries. Now, boundaries has been a hot topic on many episodes in the Work It, Remote podcast, but today this is gonna speak specifically to the unique challenges child free women face when it comes to setting limits at work the reality is more and more women are not having children or are choosing to have them later in life. In fact, there was a recent article by CBS News that said that nearly one in four, one in four, so 25% of millennials and Gen Zs don't plan to have kids. that's such a high number, right?

 And yet while there's a rise in women not having children, The workplace hasn't fully caught up with this reality. 

 women without children often face an. Unspoken assumption that because they don't have kids, they're available. They're available for late nights, for extra projects for last minute favors.

And so this episode is about supporting women who are child free to start creating those boundaries that work for them and give them tools to do that. 

But this is also about building empathy for our peers and for our growing community of women whose stories and challenges are just too often overlooked. whether you're child free or you are a parent, or you're somewhere in between, we all have a role to play in creating more equitable and respectful workplaces.

 Well, today. You're gonna hear conversations that's gonna dig into this.

My first guest host, Lanita Green, is going to sit down and talk with our featured guest, Arius. Now Lanita and I go way back. We met in grad school and she's been a collaborator since then. She's a trusted partner. When I am thinking of something or going through a career moment or a life moment, and she brought this topic to me, she's.

Personally connected to it and passionate about it as a woman in her forties navigating her career with no children. and when she shared this idea with me, I thought it was really interesting and given how passionate she was about it, I really felt like she'd be the best person to drive the conversation and really dig into it.

 Kas also immediately came to mind. Kas is a former manager of mine way back in the day, and she's risen to high levels in her career. She's a communications executive that has led global teams global brand launches and worked with some really esteemed brand.

Most recently, she was head of communications and PR at Maserati. She's also. a self-described recovering workaholic.

 she has real life experience navigating this topic I think Kas gives some really great advice around how to take control of your time and be empowered and confident when doing so. And together in this episode, what they've done is really unpack. Some of the experiences of child-free women, 

 Lanita and Kas are driving this conversation. I am excited for you to hear it and they dive right in, so we are too.  

La’Nita Green:  have you personally experienced or observed child-free women being expected to work longer or take extra responsibilities on? How did that

[00:03:36] Kas Rigas: So I, I definitely have, and I think I. Often what happens is colleagues assume that your schedule is automatically more flexible, if you don't have children. the reality is that we all have families, we all have personal obligations regardless of whether we have children or not. Right? 

 One of the things about being professional, and I think being a team player and helping out a colleague on occasion when they're in a bind, um, is, is something that we should all do, right? That's just part of the workplace. You help people out in a situation, maybe they have to go home sooner than they expected, and certainly you would expect the same thing when you have an issue.

 but what happens is. Behavior like that becomes a slippery slope because you telegraph that you're available for extra work or you're available for working late. And if that happens all the time, um, you know, colleagues that have to leave early for any reason and often it is related to their kids, will know that you are always available to help out.

And that creates

[00:04:44] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm.

[00:04:44] Kas Rigas: some bad situations, I would say.

[00:04:49] La’Nita Green: Why do you think there's an assumption that child-free people have more available time to work?

[00:04:54] Kas Rigas: Again, I think it goes back to flexibility, right? So nothing obviously against my colleagues with with kids. I have nieces and nephews. I love spending time with them. I think what happens though in a family situation, especially with the female head of household as they call them, is your schedule becomes less flexible because.

[00:05:15] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm.

[00:05:17] Kas Rigas: kids, right? So if a child needs to be picked up at a specific time from school or daycare, or if they need to go home sick, like there are certain constraints that a female head of household might have that if you don't, have kids. That's not the case. But there's also like this inherent assumption that if you don't have kids, you have more time.

Well, you know what? We all have the same amount of time in the day, right? It's about how we choose to spend it and how we choose to use it. Right? we don't have more time. We all have exactly the same amount of time in the day.

[00:05:52] La’Nita Green: Right. So I worked full time, sometimes I worked two to three jobs and I went to college

[00:06:00] Kas Rigas: Yep.

[00:06:01] La’Nita Green: full time. So I really didn't have

[00:06:04] Kas Rigas: No, you didn't.

[00:06:04] La’Nita Green: I didn't have kids, like I was busy. So it's interesting

[00:06:09] Kas Rigas: And

[00:06:10] La’Nita Green: just make

[00:06:11] Kas Rigas: exactly, and, and here's the reality, and again, you know nothing against husbands and partners out there. However, if you're a female head of household. You do have more obligations in your day. And that's just the reality of life. I mean, women do more. There have been a million studies about, you know, if a homemaker got paid they would make over a hundred thousand a year because of the amount of work that they do, right?

So when you are a working woman and you have an apartment or a home plus children. there's a lot of, balls in the air at all time, if you will. Um,

[00:06:50] La’Nita Green: Yeah.

[00:06:51] Kas Rigas: so that's definitely something to consider for all working women. 

 So how does remote work make it easier or harder to set boundaries in this situation?

So in my opinion, I definitely think remote work has made it more challenging. I think that the pandemic. Even though it's we're five years out of that, it set a bad precedent of being at your desk for more hours. You didn't have the commuting time, you didn't have the travel time, you walked from your bedroom to your office 

 This intense conflation of work and life in a way that it hadn't been before. 

 One of the important things for everyone to remember it, whether, you know you have children or you don't have children, if you have to drop off a call for any reason, you should be empowered to say, Hey, I need to drop off this call. I have another commitment. see you later, talk to you soon, whatever.

Um, we should all be empowered to do that, because we all have other commitments and.

[00:07:57] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm.

[00:07:58] Kas Rigas: during that pandemic period, it seemed like the statistics were there, everybody was working more hours. It was a fact, and then that became a bit of a hangover into life now.

[00:08:08] La’Nita Green: Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I definitely saw myself

[00:08:13] Kas Rigas: Mm-hmm.

[00:08:14] La’Nita Green: and then I think in the beginning it was like I couldn't really distinguish between work and personal life, and then I, I personally had to set those

[00:08:25] Kas Rigas: Exactly.

[00:08:26] La’Nita Green: So getting into the boundaries, what are some effective ways to establish those clear work life boundaries as a remote worker?

[00:08:35] Kas Rigas: So I'm definitely not a boundaries expert. I'm still learning. And I think we all have to, look at the ebbs and flows of life and what's going on, and it's healthy to reevaluate your boundaries on an ongoing basis. So one of the things that I, I looked at and I read about when I was preparing for this interview, I looked at an article called A Guide to Setting Better Boundaries, 

It's in the Harvard Business Review, and I definitely recommend folks take a look at that article. One of the interesting things that they said is to try different boundaries and it takes time, right? So for example, um. If you, if your challenge is always working late, which is something that we talked about earlier, Lanita, that you set a boundary for yourself and it's a rule for yourself that you don't work late on Wednesday, Thursdays and Fridays, but on Mondays and Tuesdays, those are your days that you give yourself the flexibility to work late.

So you don't necessarily have to tell everyone. Uh, you just kind of create the rule for yourself, and you, you, you write it down. This is the other thing that I've learned in life. You're more likely to achieve your goals if you write them down. There have been a lot of studies around the process of writing.

And how it engages your brain in a different way to be more committed to what you wrote down and to remember it right. I'm a real believer. I have a ton of notebooks and I have a notebook for different things that I'm doing and different things that I'm working on. And just write it down so you know, I Kas Rigas will not work late.

On Wednesday through Friday, but I'll be available if needed to work late on Monday and Tuesdays. So that's one of the things that this article also recommends that to try different things because again, depending on what's going on in life, you may need a different boundary, if you will, and then you can adjust 'em.

And I do have to say. As a manager, so speaking as an employee and a manager, right? So when you're a manager, I admit that sometimes you don't have a full picture of what's going on and what folks are working on. And I think the other thing that happens with managers is the further more senior you get and the further away you get from the actual work is that you don't have a full picture of how long a specific assignment takes.

Right? So one of the things I would say for boundary setting when you wanna say no to something would be an approach that's more about, okay, you know, Lanita, you're my boss this week I have five different deadlines, Lanita, and I have project A, B, C, and D. And I know you want me to do Project E, but unfortunately with all the colliding deadlines.

I will need to prioritize, and I'd like your guidance in prioritizing what deadlines we can change and if there's anyone else that might be able to take on one of my assignments. Because based on what's on my plate, I don't want to, not meet my deadlines and not meet my commitments. Right. And. In that case, you're giving your manager a solution.

'cause you're saying, Hey, you know, this is what's going on. I've, I've gotta drop this one thing. Can you help, can you suggest a better deadline? A different deadline? Or perhaps, you know, someone else can take. Take this on. You know, I think Erica has some time. Maybe Erica can take it on. Right? So I think it's important to, you know, you don't wanna come.

This is something that people always talk about. You don't wanna go to your manager with problems. You wanna go with solutions. You don't wanna be like, oh my gosh, I have so much work, I don't know what to do. Okay. I know what to do. I know I have to drop one assignment. I need your help to figure out if the deadline can.

Be changed or if someone else can take it on. Right, and And I think that is. Part of boundary setting. I'm more focused on like working late because that's one of the things that unfortunately I always have an issue with personally

[00:13:04] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm.

[00:13:05] Kas Rigas: my boundary and keeping to it. But it's also when you know you have too much on your plate to have that relationship with your manager and to be able to flag it and tell them, what's going on.

[00:13:18] La’Nita Green: that's a, a really good recommendation. people say it all the time. Don't come with

[00:13:27] Kas Rigas: Yeah.

[00:13:27] La’Nita Green: make sure that you also bring solutions to the table. But I think when you're overwhelmed sometimes you don't always think about that. So this is just a good reminder to make sure that, you know, you take a beat and think of a solution

[00:13:44] Kas Rigas: It is true.

[00:13:44] La’Nita Green: before you bring it to

[00:13:45] Kas Rigas: It is true. And then there's also like a notion of, and again, this article goes into it a little bit more in depth, what they consider hard and soft boundaries, right? there are some things in your life that are kind of non-negotiables. And again, I think part of it is relentless prioritization.

So

[00:14:06] La’Nita Green: Yeah.

[00:14:07] Kas Rigas: what. Are the non-negotiables, right? So again, I'm gonna make this up. If you go to a fitness class two nights a week, it starts at seven o'clock. To me, being able to make a seven o'clock dinner or a seven o'clock fitness class from work is not an unreasonable request. And maybe that's your non-negotiable, right?

That you just write that down and you say, this is what I'm sticking to. A couple of other tips and tricks that I've found helpful is, with remote work, often what happens is your calendar gets piled up with calls and you don't have time in between.

And I would struggle with that because. For every call you're on, you need prep time and you need recap time. So what I started doing in my calendar, and again, I encourage folks to try this and see if it works for them. Either set a 30 minute or a 15 minute block before and after each meeting. And again, I call that a boundary too, right?

Because you're saying I need 15 minutes to prepare for this meeting, to read the agenda, to write myself some notes to be really ready and. this call is an hour long. And then at the end of the call, I wanna take time to recap what I need to do. What are my action items? I mean, now there's software that will capture all the notes for you so that you can be more active, especially when you're working remote.

 It'll capture all the notes so you don't have to worry about scribbling things down as much, but I still think you need that time after the call to think about what went on and to essentially put it on your to-do list and, and get ready for what you need to accomplish before you get on the next call.

 another tip that I'd love to share in terms of a healthy boundary is blocking a two hour repeating time slot, perhaps on a Friday, two or three hour, depending on, you know, what your day looks like. And I would use this time to review my assignments for the next week and make sure I've met all the deadlines.

'cause often you have Friday deadlines. And so if you set this time in the morning, for example, on a Friday morning. To know that you finished everything and potentially to finish whatever assignments you might have due that day. And then just to give a good perspective, to yourself on what you have to accomplish, the next week.

 boundaries. it's a challenging topic because people don't wanna disappoint. Right. I wanna mention kind of the difference between the employee perspective and the manager perspective. and I'll use myself as the example. Early in my career I was super eager to learn everything.

[00:16:53] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[00:17:07] Kas Rigas: for something new, something that I wanted to learn, and I was super eager. And this created a situation where I became the go-to person, right? If there was a challenging last minute assignment, oh, Kas is gonna do that.

That's perfect for right. So it made me feel good because my colleagues trusted me. They trusted me with important assignments. There were time bound and tight deadlines, and that's good for your personal brand, right? As a core person, you know, young in your career, looking to build your brand, being the go-to person that can handle challenging assignments with tight deadlines is something that's really great to be known for.

However.

[00:17:53] La’Nita Green: Right.

[00:17:54] Kas Rigas: The challenge is that you start resenting the fact that you are getting the work right, because other folks are not as keen or eager to step up, right? So I guess you can say sometimes you have to learn the hard way. That sometimes raising your hand all the time and taking stuff on, you have to like not do that necessarily.

And that's another boundary to set for yourself, right? To be

[00:18:26] La’Nita Green: I,

[00:18:27] Kas Rigas: more aware of that. However, again, I'll make the distinction because from a manager perspective, when I was a manager, I loved those people because it showed me that they were eager. That they had a can-do attitude, that they were willing to take stuff on, challenging assignments that other folks wouldn't necessarily take on.

And to me, that person who was the go-getter was a better employee. Whereas the individual who, for example, you know, I would give them an assignment. They would say, oh, I have to go to yoga tonight. Not a good look. Um, although I'd love to go to yoga classes every night of the week if I could. Right. Um, but again, it's, you have to balance that.

You can't be always looking for new things and asking for new assignments. And on the other side of the coin, you can't always be saying no when someone comes to you. Right. So that's where balancing the boundaries comes in. Yeah, that was a very long answer, but it is a complicated, right? We, we've talked about this like boundaries are a complicated thing and they bring up a lot of behaviors.

Like for example, I'm a recovering people pleaser and perfectionist, right? So part of my personal brand is. I don't wanna say no to people. I wanna say yes, I wanna help them out,

[00:19:54] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm.

[00:19:54] Kas Rigas: and I wanna help out my colleagues when they're in a bind Because again, if I'm helping them out, eventually I'll be in a situation where I might need a hand and I know I can call on them, right?

So some of it is teamwork, but you do have to try to reign that in, especially when you start becoming resentful, because you

[00:20:14] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm.

[00:20:14] Kas Rigas: all the work, if you will.

[00:20:18] La’Nita Green: Question for you as a manager, how can an employee just say, I have a hard stop at whatever time. Like how can we start making that the end of it? Like I have a hard stop period. Like why do I have

[00:20:34] Kas Rigas: I know.

[00:20:34] La’Nita Green: that I have yoga or I have a dinner? Like how do we change that culture and just. Let listen, you know, I have a hard stop at this time.

How do we make that

[00:20:44] Kas Rigas: Yeah. I.

[00:20:45] La’Nita Green: how do we

[00:20:46] Kas Rigas: It's a great question because I agree and I said it earlier, um, you know, and then I said something opposite just now, right? So earlier I said that we should all be empowered to say, You know, I have to drop. I know this call was only supposed to run until five.

 we're at five 15, so I, I have to drop for another commitment. I don't think you have to say what the commitment is because you know what? I might be having dinner with my college roommate. Someone else might be going to pick up their child from preschool. You might have a yoga class. Your yoga class is not more important than me, getting home to have dinner with my husband, right?

So.

[00:21:28] La’Nita Green: right.

[00:21:29] Kas Rigas: it's, it's a really great point that you shouldn't have to qualify. You know why? Especially when it's a reasonable time. It's not like, you are cutting out of work hours before you should be. a message to repeat to yourself is.

 I see we're getting to the end of the call. I have a commitment, so, if it's something that we wanna restart tomorrow, please look for time on my calendar. but I'm gonna, I'm gonna drop off this call now. Thanks so much. Right. In a positive way, I guess I would say Lanita rather than, and it's true.

You don't have to tell people,

[00:22:07] La’Nita Green: right,

[00:22:08] Kas Rigas: need to know.

[00:22:09] La’Nita Green: So your point about the calendar, I actually block out at least an hour every single day because as you know, as communicators, sometimes if we have to draft a story or whatever, you need that time to Collect your thoughts and just get yourself prepared for the day.

And I also reserve one hour a week, every week no matter what, to learn something

[00:22:33] Kas Rigas: That's great.

[00:22:34] La’Nita Green: so that hour is my time, you know, and it doesn't matter. It could be watching a webinar or comms or, some latest advances in ai, but I'm a continuous learner and I'm just like, that time, like it'll make me a better employee.

It makes me a better person. and I think that's

[00:22:54] Kas Rigas: Absolutely,

[00:22:54] La’Nita Green: you, that might be two hours on Friday for me, that's one hour

[00:22:59] Kas Rigas: absolutely.

[00:22:59] La’Nita Green: you know, it's, it's do

[00:23:01] Kas Rigas: Note.

[00:23:01] La’Nita Green: and I put that on my calendar,

[00:23:03] Kas Rigas: You should. Absolutely. Because one of the things that remote work does is if people see your calendar opened, they just go to town. All the meetings get

[00:23:14] La’Nita Green: so

[00:23:15] Kas Rigas: right. if you try the 30 minutes before each meeting, 30 minutes after each meeting, once a meeting goes in your calendar, you reserve that other time so that you can prep for each call.

But you know what that.

[00:23:28] La’Nita Green: Yeah.

[00:23:29] Kas Rigas: What you just suggested might even be a better approach for some people, right? In terms of boundary setting, every morning you block your first hour to get yourself oriented, I look at, at it as, you're the CEO of yourself, right? 

So, Nita Inc. Kas Inc. We're the CEOs of ourselves and just like you would prep a CEO for their day. Take that hour in the morning and you prep yourself for your day. You look at your meeting schedule, you make sure you've got everything at your fingertips. If there's any last minute research you have to do and you just get yourself ready for the day.

And to me that's a boundary and that's kind of sacred time, Depending on how you choose to use it. Um, and you do have to, it's trial and error, I think again.

[00:24:18] La’Nita Green: Mm-hmm.

[00:24:19] Kas Rigas: hard boundaries versus soft boundaries is definitely something to explore as an individual, because what works for me doesn't necessarily work for someone else.

[00:24:27] La’Nita Green: Exactly, exactly. 

[00:24:30] Kas Rigas: what do you want people to walk away with? what is your advice? To someone struggling to advocate for themselves in this situation.

So I would go back to the relentless prioritization piece. And encouraging people to test out boundaries, both hard boundaries and soft boundaries, and reevaluate those boundaries in terms of your personal schedule, the types of assignments you wanna take on. Um, and do it in a positive way, right By, by offering solutions.

Um, again, I think who your manager is really matters making sure that that individual has an understanding of what's on your plate work-wise, and having frequent check-ins to make sure they understand what you're contributing to the workplace and, and, and what you're doing, and so that they have a sense of when there's too much going on.

And then I would say the other thing that we touched on, which I'm glad you brought this up, Juanita, that you don't need to tell people why you need to drop off a call or why you need to leave at 5:00 PM 5 15, 6 30, 6:00 PM to be somewhere, right. Um, in a virtual environment. There's nothing wrong with just saying, I have to drop, have another commitment.

But I'm happy to pick this up tomorrow. Take a look at my schedule. Feel free to schedule some additional time since it sounds like we need some additional time to cover this topic. I think if, if you could do those things, I think it would definitely give you a better, balanced, work situation where you are not feeling overwhelmed and you're not feeling like you're doing too much and other folks are doing less.

Right.

[00:26:25] La’Nita Green: Yeah, yeah, I would add to that, I think leaders need to lead by

[00:26:31] Kas Rigas: Yep.

[00:26:32] La’Nita Green: You know, if you start taking that time out of your day and. You know, you put that do not disturb message

[00:26:40] Kas Rigas: It's true.

[00:26:41] La’Nita Green: and you know, you empower your, your employees to take time off or to prioritize themselves, then I think it'll make it easier.

Because oftentimes when you're new in your career, you're afraid to ask for those things that

[00:26:54] Kas Rigas: It is true.

[00:26:54] La’Nita Green: Um, so it's kind of up to managers to ask those questions and. Be the change, I guess be the change that you wanna

[00:27:02] Kas Rigas: It's true.

[00:27:03] La’Nita Green: to use that phrase like, I think it's important for us to do that as leaders. And you mentioned that, you know, as a worker you should talk to your manager and say, Hey, I have this on my plate. But I also think it's important for, uh, leaders to

[00:27:16] Kas Rigas: Yep.

[00:27:17] La’Nita Green: What's on your plate? Again, just to help, help the younger, uh, workers along and, um, you know, just ensure that they're getting the right mentorship, uh, that they need to be successful in the

[00:27:29] Kas Rigas: Absolutely. Absolutely. That's a great point.

[00:27:34] La’Nita Green: Well, this has been a great conversation from one childless worker to the, to the

[00:27:39] Kas Rigas: Thank you.

[00:27:40] La’Nita Green: next. I think we both have some shared experiences, especially with the, unfair expectations of, workload and all of that. I would hope that people would walk away from this episode with more empathy for all people whether they have children or not. And I hope that we can just be more thoughtful, and be more respectful of all people and where they

[00:28:05] Kas Rigas: Absolutely. Absolutely.  

Erika Bergen: Thanks so much for tuning in to this conversation on boundary setting for child-free women at work. Huge thanks to La’Nita Green for bringing this topic forward and to Kas Rigas for sharing her honesty, wisdom, and lived experience.

If this episode resonated with you, I’d love for you to share it with a friend or teammate who might need to hear it. And if you're navigating this dynamic in your own workplace—know that you're not alone, and you don’t need permission to protect your time.

Until next time, keep advocating for yourself and others, and keep working it—your way.