Playing the ‘Mom and career’ game

Background 

My story is Probably an atypical story about how a new employee at a company with a baby at home gets promoted to the position of team leader. For most women, this might seem like a fantasy, but I am happy to tell how this is my real life. 

I started working at Pixellot, a leader in sportstech automation, right after my return from maternity leave. Moving to a new company was another challenge after I decided not to return to my previous company, in addition to now being the mother of two young children. 

Despite all the difficulties, I was promoted after just four months on the job to be a team leader. I have to admit that being dedicated to my career at the same time as being a full-time wife and mother was not easy, but as they say; when there’s a will there’s a way and I’m happy to share some of the guiding principles that helped me along the way. 

Dare to Win  

A while ago I came across some research that was conducted by HP. According to what they found, it appears that women will not apply for positions they don’t feel or think they are 100% suited for.  When you think about it that’s pretty amazing, but it’s something every woman knows… so I made a decision that I am not going to be that kind of woman!  

To begin with, I did not go back to my previous job. I decided I wanted to take on new challenges even though I knew it would be that much more difficult having a baby plus another young child at home.     

I came across an opening at Pixelot that looked very interesting, even though I have to admit that I didn’t really fit the job requirements, especially when it came to the experience that was sought. Nonetheless, I figured I have nothing to lose. I’m going for it! 

Being ambitious and goal-driven, I knew that it was not enough just to do a good job. I knew that I had to communicate my achievements in order to get the right attention from my managers to move forward. 

So, I mapped out a strategy that I thought would be important to follow. These are some of the steps that were on my list:  

• Ask to lead projects (even though I was the newest person on the team) 
• Continually make suggestions for improving processes, whether in hallway conversations, personal conversations, or staff meetings 
• Take on more tasks, (which was not an easy feat for a full-time mom) 
• Last but certainly not least was to have a constant awareness that there are usually plenty of office politics involved. That meant knowing how to play the game. (Lucky for me, the Pixellot environment is proving to be a very supportive one with few intrigues)  

I put all this effort into my game plan even though I had no idea what would come out of all this investment in time and effort. But I was determined not just to sit down and do my job. I wanted to make sure that I would get noticed for my initiative and responsibility. 

When challenges can turn into an advantage 

Surprisingly the COVID-19 pandemic actually was a big help to me as it actually brought a much-appreciated life-balance between work and home. It is important not to forget the things for your soul (like my baking hobby) with all the stuff you have on your plate. Working remotely and in a hybrid model actually made it much easier to juggle the time between being a mother and managing a development team. (Like utilizing the time between meetings to let the dough rise!). 

It became much easier for me to manage a lot of projects (both personal and professional) when I was close by physically. With the help of a nanny and being able to complete tasks during the evening, at night, and on weekends made things a lot easier.  

Baking hobby? that I realized that with the right flexibility, it was possible to complete the necessary assignments and still find crucial time for the kids. 

I also realized at that point that I needed to release the fear I had in two aspects: 

1. The fear of not being with the kids full-time.  

2. The fear of being branded a ‘working mom’ who constantly needs to leave work early.  

Once I was able to adopt that mindset, it was easy to formulate the key to success for other mothers who are balancing kids and a career.  

The keys to success 

To sum up, the 3 great keys in my mind are: 

• Be Flexible – Remember that plenty of tasks can be completed alone in the evening, and during overtime hours. 
• Be productive – Make sure that you put sufficient effort into time management (a combination of children, mothers, and tasks), planning a week in advance. 
• Let go – Curb all those negative feelings  and fears about not being with the kids enough or feeling guilty for deciding to “leave early today.” 

Last but not least, if you want to move ahead, you need to have a plan. And it certainly pays to work for a good company that appreciates the effort! 

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Shani Berkovich is a Software Team Leader at Pixellot, the global leader for AI automated sports video & analytics.

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