Thanks to a Mommy Track’d post called MBAs Are Opting Out for the link to the article by Reuters called More women with MBAs take mommy track than doctors: study.
I can’t say I’m surprised for a variety of reasons. I have an MBA and although I never thought of completely opting out of the business world to be a full time stay at home mom (other than the first 6 months of my kids’ lives), I did choose a more flexible transition back into the workforce by starting my own company. That way I could start them off in part time care until I felt they and I were ready for them to go to full time care.
According to the article by Reuters, “The University of California Berkeley Haas School of Business study of nearly 1,000 Harvard undergraduates found that 15 years after graduation, business school graduates were more likely than doctors or lawyers to leave the workforce.”
It continues by saying “Those surveyed were about 37 years old and had at least one child. Fifteen years after graduating from Harvard College, 28 percent of the women who went on to get MBAs were stay-at-home moms. By comparison, only 6 percent of MDs stopped working outside of the home. Of the MBAs surveyed, 27 percent had careers in the financial sector and 17 percent worked in consulting. The majority of the MDs worked in specialties centered on women (13 percent in obstetrics/gynecology), children (31 percent in pediatric medicine), and family.”
As a business student, there’s not often a set path like there is for med students. In the medical field, you finish school, you do your internship, you do your residency, and then you get hired into a private practice or university to continue in your field. Sure the field of medicine changes but apparently not as fast as the field of business.
Business is all about your network and skills. Moms/Parents who stay at home with their kids are advised to continue building and keep up with their network. Medicine is definitely about your skills, but you usually don’t get hired on to a hospital or private practice based on who you know, it has more to do with what you know and where you got your degree!
I find it interesting that I know several MBA women friends who have opted out of pursuing a career while their kids are young and at the same time my OB/GYN and pediatrician (who both happen to be women) came back to work shortly after their kids were born. Our pediatrician came back to work only about 8 weeks after her baby was born. I think both of them are amazing and incredible doctors!
I remember my OB saying how important it was that I take it easy after the baby was born and to take as much time off as possible. I then made a comment to her about the fact she returned to work after her babies were born and she was able to manage it, and she kind of stared at me blankly and didn’t seem to know what to say.
So what do you think the reasons are for the different parenting choices made between moms who got a business degree and those who got a medical degree? I have some ideas, but I’d love to know what you think.
Author: Aruni |
Filed under: diversity,
mom,
mother,
parenting |
Tags: MBA,
med school,
moms in business school,
OB/GYN,
pediatrician |
5 Comments »
I babble about business, babies, and parenthood on this blog, so those of you who come here to read my posts on entrepreneurship but do not have babies, please forward this post to your friends and family who do have babies. For those who have babies and dabble in business, these tips might be right up your alley. If you have babies and have no interest in business, then send it on to the folks you know who are knee-deep in business and encourage them to have a baby! 🙂 To see other great baby tips, check out the baby tips category.
Maryam Ghaemmaghami Scoble was kind enough to let me re-publish her January 30, 3007 tips on traveling with baby that she said was inspired after I asked her if she would write a guest baby tip for my blog. She also sent me an adorable picture of her looking at baby Milan. Maryam has been working as an event planner since 1995 and is now taking time off to be with her newborn son. Maryam’s husband, Robert Scoble, is none other than the “Scobleizer” a strong presence in the blogging community. Maryam spends her free time blogging about living, loving, and working with geeks as well as life, love, and everything else. If you are new to the blogosphere, you might not have heard that she and Robert had a baby, but they did and now she has great tips to share!
Traveling with Baby? Here are fifteen things I’ve learned.
I honestly thought that my days of traveling adventure would be over once our baby was born. Not so! Barely four months old, Milan has accompanied us without much fuss to Paris, London and Vegas, traveling via Trains, Planes, and even on a bus. We are headed to Geneva next.
If you are traveling with child I highly recommend checking out My Traveling Buddy website.
Baby Center has a great checklist on things to take with you while traveling with child.
My advice based on my own experience:
1) Don’t pack too many little bags and suitcases. You will leave things behind or else won’t be able to carry all of them together. While it was easier before to have smaller, lighter suitcases, you now need to try and consolidate as much as possible. Remember in addition to the suitcases, you also have to push the stroller and you only have two hands 🙂 I used to pack a suitcase, a carry on and a bag for each of us and it worked perfectly before, but now one of us has to push the stroller while the other carries everything on the cart. My heart goes out to single parents!
2) Don’t forget the baby Bjorn or other form of baby carrier with you. You need to check in your stroller and sometimes have to walk long distances before claiming it back after you get off the plane. You can check in the stroller right where you check in to get on the flight, but you won’t get it back when you land until you walk all the way to baggage claim. In London, we had to walk far and long, and wait quite a while before getting our stroller back. Thank God, I packed a baby carrier with me.
3) Don’t forget the bottle washer and soap. It’s hard to wash bottles without the bottle washer and the soap at the hotels or airports might be too fragrant for the baby. I had to send Robert out to search for a bottle washer in Vegas and I had a hard time finding a perfume free soap in beautiful Paris, home to many famous perfumes.
4) If you are using formula, make a bottle ready before going through security screening. They won’t let you carry a bottle of water but they would let you carry the milk through. The bottle would be safe for an hour and two and you are not forced to run around and look for bottled water in the airport. The security officer in the Vegas airport told me that I could get out of line, mix my formula with water and go through again if I wanted to. I didn’t want to wait in line again, but next time, I will just make the formula ahead of time.
5) Check in early for your flight so you can make sure your baby has a bassinet on board. You can’t reserve one on the phone and if too many babies are traveling on board, you may lose out to those who checked in before you. We were late to check in for our flight to London and couldn’t get a bassinet as there were twenty other babies traveling on board. We got smart on the way back and checked in early 🙂
6) Make sure your baby is sucking on a pacifier or a bottle during take off and landing. The air pressure won’t hurt their ears as much. We were feeding Milan while the plane was taking off and landing and he fell asleep each time without crying.
7) If traveling by train find out where the bathroom with diaper changing table is located and book your cabin close to that. I had to walk through over ten cabins while the train was moving with a baby that badly needed a change, all the while worrying if we were going to reach the station soon.
8)Pack enough formula and diapers. Babies sometimes show allergic reaction to different brands of diapers. It’s also very hard to find the same brand of formula while traveling abroad and babies stomach often react to new brands.We ran out of formula in Paris and I couldn’t even read the instructions on the formula I bought and had to trust the reluctant pharmacist advice. Luckily Milan liked the new formula and it worked fine for us. Next time, I will pack extra formula though.
9) Having a travel system based car seat and stroller (we use Graco) works best because you can use the car seat in the cabs, buses, trains and cars, and then place the seat easily in the stroller when walking around. The stroller folds easily and is light to carry around. You can also use it as a cart to carry stuff around.
10) If you have older children I suggest running them through the airport to let them exert some of that extra energy so that they are good and tired and ready to sleep in flight. Planning travel during their sleep time is also a good idea.
11) With older children taking some cheap new toys and coloring materials helps keep them occupied during flight. When Patrick was younger, I always bought him a bunch of magazines so he could read them during the flight and of course he had his trusty hand held game players.
12) Remember that there are different rules for traveling with babies domestically vs. internationally. For example, babies traveling on your lap can fly for free on United inside the US but you have to purchase a ticket for them while traveling abroad. It usually comes to about 10% of your adult fare plus taxes, etc.
13) You need a valid passport for children traveling abroad with you, even if your child is only four months old like ours.
14) Before traveling make sure to check with your pediatrician about any medical issues you need to be aware of. Traveling with babies under three months is not recommended and some airlines won’t even allow a new born to fly. Depending on the country you are traveling to, your baby may need to get special vaccinations. I packed over the counter gas-relief medicine and baby Tylenol with us just in case.
15) Last but not least, check the weather and pack accordingly for your child. It was raining hard in London and Paris and we looked around for a long time before we were able to find a waterproof plastic cover for Milan’s stroller.
Bon Voyage and Happy travels!
______
If you like this tip, you might be interested in our other recent guest baby tips:
Throw A Baby Kegger For Your Buddy by Clay Nichols at DadLabs
Keeping a Baby Food Journal by Neena at A Mom’s Life at NeenMachine.com
Increasing Milk Supply by Carole Hayes at Alias Tex
Note to new readers: these tips are based on our experiences, as well as those of our friends and readers. Please always consult with your doctor before implementing any tip that might impact the health of your baby. If you have a tip you’d like to submit please send an email to blogger at babblesoft dot com. Please check the ‘baby tips’ category to make sure your tip (in some form or fashion) hasn’t already been posted. If it has been, feel free to comment on that post and support the tip. We also welcome respectful challenges to the tips because as is noted in our inaugural baby tip ‘everything is relative!’ We will, of course, give anyone who submits a tip we publish credit and lotsa link love!
Author: Aruni |
Filed under: baby tips,
travel |
Tags: baby Bjorn,
baby carrier,
baby tip,
bottle feeding,
bottle washer,
bottles,
diaper,
formula feeding,
guest baby tip,
lap child,
maryam scoble,
medical travel,
pacifier,
passport for babies,
pediatrician,
Robert Scoble,
Scobleizer,
travel car seat,
travel toys,
travel weather,
traveling with a lap child,
traveling with baby,
Tylenol,
weather |
13 Comments »
I finally got around to taking our son for his 5 year well-check, and he passed with flying colors! Not that there is a pass or fail to the well-check experience, but I felt good about it (a.k.a. I felt like a good mom). 🙂
Our pediatrician (who I really like) checked him over and then the nurse came in to conduct his vision and hearing tests. When he was 4 years old, the nurse asked him to read the lines of letters on a sign that they placed down a hallway…very much like an adult eye exam. This time the nurse gave him a square laminated card with different shapes on it (i.e., square, heart, house, circle) and asked him to point to the shape on his card that she was pointing to on a sign that was on a door down the hallway. I’m a bad judge of distances so I can’t say exactly how far the sign was but maybe 15 to 20 feet away? She then had me put my hand over each of his eyes and asked him to find the shapes with just one of his eyes. I thought it was a very clever and unique test, because not only was it testing his vision but also his shape recognition and matching abilities.
He then got his chicken pox vaccine booster, which he chose to get in his arm instead of his thigh, where he has gotten all of his in the past. He complained a little bit but then seemed to forget it fairly quickly mostly because our doctor promised to show him a magic trick. Even though it’s been over a year since his last well check, he still remembers that she does magic tricks. The magic trick she did today was to have him tear up a paper towel and put it in her magic bag that has a handle on it. She shakes the bag, the pieces of paper towel disappear, and when she turns the bag over a bunch of stickers fall out!
He was thrilled with his super hero and Sesame Street stickers, and I was thrilled that the doctor said he is doing well and that he was a very bright kid. 🙂
Author: Aruni |
Filed under: parenting |
Tags: annual chek,
audio visual testing,
hearing test,
medical well-check,
pediatrician,
vision testing |
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