Career vs. Kids: Do you have to choose?
Our team is celebrating Mother’s day 2020 with a difficult conversation about motherhood and balancing a career. Featuring three of our lovely WIID Board Members, Miranda Degg, Mona Sharma, and Lea Stewart.
The decision to become a parent is one that weighs heavily on many women. It can be especially tricky to navigate that decision as a woman in a male-dominated industry where mothers are scarcely represented. In honor of Mother’s Day 2020, we asked some of our panelists what their biggest concerns with starting a family are and got some insight from a mom currently trying to balance it all.
Illustration by Lea Stewart, WIID Lead Blog Curator
AS INDUSTRIAL DESIGNERS WHO ARE THINKING ABOUT HAVING CHILDREN IN THE FUTURE, WHAT’S YOUR BIGGEST FEAR WHEN IT COMES TO BEING A MOM IN ID?
Hear some thoughts from Miranda Degg and Mona Sharma of our board.
“I feel that there is an expectation for women to settle down and start a family early in their lives. I see a lot of media describe this as ‘having it all.’ I fear that the pressure I perceive will have a negative effect on my ability to perform effectively as a mother and as a designer.” —Miranda Degg
“ID can be quite thought consuming, and the creative industry is well known for working over hours with tight deadlines. I wouldn't want my work to suffer as I am passionate about it, but obviously would also not want my child to suffer in any way either!!” —Mona Sharma
AS AN ID + career MOM CURRENTLY TRYING TO BALANCE BOTH, IS IT POSSIBLE TO REALLY “HAVE IT ALL?”
Pictured: Expert ID mom and WIID’s Lead Blog Curator, Lea Stewart, Senior Manager of Industrial Design in the Baby Division at Newell Brands, holding with her son Drake.
Ten years ago, when I was dating my now-husband, he shared his worry that I would never be willing to slow down enough in my industrial design career to have children. Hearing that made my own fear escalate. Did having kids mean you have to “slow down” your ID career, and if so, what does that even mean?
Now having a two-year-old, I can tell you it is amazing to be an industrial design manager and a mom. I knew very few ID moms at the time we started planning for parenthood.
I am lucky to have many moms in our office, working in fashion, graphics, and related fields that I look to as role models. If you don’t have moms in your office, talking to a mom in a related industry is helpful.
What do you think about the idea of “slowing down” in your career? Did you have to do that when you had your son? Hear what Lea Stewart, our inspiring resident ID mom who does it all, has to say about it.
Here is what I think I know now about what “slowing down” means: working moms in any field will tell you not to expect that your best year of performance will come during the year of maternity leave, so you will have to be ok with that.
Your hormones will do all kinds of things to your brain, and you will be sleep-deprived. This is temporary and will not affect the long-term vision for your career. I promise you this. Some may choose to find a more flexible contract position or stay home longer when their kids are very young. At that same time, I was on the journey to conceive; I hired a contract ID mom, who is now a partner in her own firm a few years later. This was awesome for me to witness that there are many options for us. It was also wonderful to be able to support that mom in giving her a flexible way to use her skills.
“Your hormones will do all kinds of things to your brain and you will be sleep-deprived. This is temporary and will not affect the long-term vision for your career. I promise you this.”
Do you think there’s any form of correlation between being a mom and being an industrial designer?
Creativity is extremely helpful when the parenting challenge is totally irrational. “What’s that toddler? Did I hear you correctly, at top volume, 500 times in a row, that you don’t want your feet? No problem! You don’t need feet if we fly across the room.” [Enact flying routine. Silliness ensues. Maybe toddler cracks a smile, or at least forgets about his objectionable feet.] Just like in brainstorm sessions, you must think quickly and be willing to express ALL ideas.
It is in our blood to research the problem, explore all possibilities and execute the best solution. But this is where we can get into trouble, thinking we can solve it all and all by ourselves. The most unexpected realization when I became a mom was that you couldn’t brainstorm your way out of all parenting challenges. This can be especially hard to recognize as hardened problem solvers. Raising a baby will be your toughest “group project” ever. Postpartum depression, colic, breastfeeding trouble, and reflux are just some examples that require engaging doctors, mental health specialists, lactation consultants, family, and other moms for support. That old phrase about it “taking a village” —yeah, so that one is true.
ID moms should be prepared to rewire their approach from I solve it to I need to crowdsource it. Being trained as a creative problem solver comes in handy to diffuse the day-to-day crazy, but that same unique skill can cause industrial design moms to struggle alone.
“ID moms should be prepared to rewire their approach from I solve it to I need to crowd source it.”
Do you have any advice for a designer or creative who is considering motherhood in their future?
You will have to get comfortable voicing your constraints, such as leaving on time to do daycare pick up or needing more notice before travel to plan for care coverage. Things like that can feel weird when you are the only one in an end-of-day meeting running over having to say you must leave. I’ve been flooring it to daycare more than once because I let it go too long before speaking up. Being an ID mom won’t mean losing your career trajectory, but it may mean making that tough choice of prioritizing your family and losing your seat at the table that day. As more industrial designers become moms, this will normalize. There will be more of us reminding everyone of the hard stop at 5:00 pm, even though we may be back online after the kids’ bedtime.
Insider tip if you are contemplated parenthood: Since there are many avenues to becoming a parent, I’d suggest exploring if your company has support for the journey, such as adoption assistance and fertility coverage.
As designers and Creatives who are looking to become mothers one day, what are you most excited about?
Miranda Degg is an Industrial Designer and VR Guru at Delve Innovation in Madison, Wisconsin. She is also a Design Advocate at Advanced Design + IDSA Northern Lakes.
“My hope is that the excitement of starting a family will stifel that paranoia, and allow me to continue being a fully functional member of my team at work and at home. I am truly thrilled at the thought of sharing all of the creative problem-solving skills I’ve learned as a designer with my future children, and see the world through their eyes.
I have no doubt that they’ll be awesome in their own way. The thought of sharing all I’ve learned with my kids is something that warms my heart and makes me excited about the future. I think it will certainly be a balancing act between my career and my family, but I hope they are always aware that they are what compels me to work hard.”
Mona Sharma is an Industrial Designer currently working at the Færch Group, a European market leader of thermoformed food packaging in Cambridge, England, UK.
“The best thing for me would be being able demonstrate creativity and being able to answer their curiosities about where things come from, how they are made and how they work.
Although I'm not a mum, I've worked with kids in a primary school setting before and it's amazing to see how creative they can be—it would probably be a great learning opportunity for us Industrial Designers too; we can observe their behaviour and how they interact with things, without them being as conscious of their surroundings as adults can be!”