Note from Cali: Please welcome Linda Roundtree, of Roundtree Consulting, as our first guest blogger! With her years of experience and passion for this field, I am honored to have her share her insights. Thanks, Linda!

Every year Working Mother magazine publishes a list of the “100 Best Companies for Working Mothers.” This year they added a question to their application about workplace programs and benefits to support employees caring for children with special needs. A great move considering these national trends:

• 1 in 5 households with children includes a child with special needs
• 13 percent of children have a disability
• Nearly 20 percent of children experience symptoms of a mental health disorder over the course of a year; 5 percent are considered to have serious emotional disorders
• 1 in 12 employees has a child with special needs

By broadening their Best Companies application, Working Mother has further challenged employers to assess needs, seek out best practices, and provide additional resources to employed parents of children with special needs.

But what are the real issues faced by these parents? Don’t all parents have the same challenges? Perhaps what most distinguishes parents of kids with special needs the most from parents of typically developing kids is the intensity and complexity of work and life arrangements they make on a daily basis – arrangements that often get more complex as the years go by. I know about this first hand. Continue Reading…

Last Call!!! Tuck Business School/Aquent/Work+Life Fit Survey: Please take a minute to complete one or both of the following brief surveys studying new career paths from both the individual and corporate perspectives—Deadline, Thursday, April 19th (to learn more please click here )

Corporate Hiring Manager Survey Link
Individual Survey Link

Incentive Magazine Q&A – Check out my interview with Editor-in-Chief, Joe Kornik. We spoke while I was driving (talking on my hands free headset) to meet my mother at a doctor’s appointment and his wife was getting ready to have a baby any minute. A perfect work+life fit scenario!

Now back to the blog….

While I know the question, “How do we work and have a personal life in a 24/7, high tech, global work reality?” affects everyone, I can still be surprised by the scope and reach of the issue. My most recent surprise was this email from a professor in academic medicine from a major teaching institution: Continue Reading…