Working from home? How could anything go wrong?
WAS he wearing pants? That has been the question most asked about Dr Robert E Kelly in the days since his BBC Skype interview went viral. You’ve seen the clip: a serious interview about South Korean economics rendered comical when Kelly’s two children wander into the room and are removed in a heroic rescue mission by their mother. Many people have reacted by commending Kelly for his lovely family. But most just want to know if he’s wearing pants.
For my part, the Kelly family invasion takes me back – because I have walked the last 20 years in Dr Kelly’s shoes/slippers. And I am still amazed, after all these years working from home, at how fascinating people find that – and by the questions they ask. Do you have a desk? How do you discipline yourself? Do you not just spend the whole time watching TV? And, yes, do you bother getting dressed?
The short answers to those questions, in my own case, are; no; having a mortgage and three hungry teenagers are discipline enough; no; and yes – though unlike Dr Kelly, my business wardrobe consists of a collection of fairly muddy tracksuits.
When my first child was born, I was lucky enough to be able to work from home. And although that was incredibly hard work – try breastfeeding a demanding infant while typing with one hand – the advantage of being present for every mewl, meal and milestone outweighed the exhaustion, and as my family expanded and grew, I realised I didn’t want to miss a minute. But financially, there was no question of my being able to give up work, and so an occasionally mad, dysfunctional home/work hybrid came to pass.
I lived in London in those early years, so my weekly slot on The Gerry Ryan Show was always done on the telephone, but soon those conversations were characterised by crying babies and inquisitive toddlers. When I suggested that maybe it was time for me to give up the slot, the producers were adamant: the soundtrack of small children was the best part of my contributions – the feedback they’d received suggested young mothers at home were hugely relieved to hear others trying to cope in the same situation.
Other phone interviews weren’t quite so successful. My Dr Kelly moment came during a conversation with an oncologist for a news story I was writing about the cost of cancer drugs. I conducted the interview in a different room from the children, leaving them in the playroom with the connecting doors wide open, just in case. Halfway through discussing the scandal of pharmaceutical monopolies, my 18-month-old son toddled into me and wordlessly put his hand down the back of his newly filled nappy. He then smeared his fingers on the receiver of the phone in my hand and wandered out again. I can only thank the stars that Skype was still a twinkle away.
MY youngest liked to sit very still with an orange bucket on her head, completely covering her little face. Many, many were the occasions when, mid-sentence, I’d look up from the kitchen table – then, as now, my ‘desk’ – and wonder if a less busy mother would be doing something about the orange bucket. That’s a question nobody asks: do you beat yourself up because you’re frequently too busy working to devote yourself fully to your children? An emphatic ‘yes’ is the answer to that one.
But she grew out of the bucket, her brother grew out of nappies. These days the biggest source of conflict in my home/workplace is my laptop and the fact my eldest uses it for her college assignments. ‘When are you going to be off that?’ is now the most commonly sighed question in this house.
Working from home with children is far from perfect, and often exhausting. But you never have to see your child run into a carer’s arms ahead of yours, and for that and many other reasons, it’s a pure privilege. And yes, Dr Robert E Kelly and I both wear pants.