Sarah Attwood

I job-share, which means we jointly manage a portfolio of clients and divide and conquer between ourselves as work comes in. For us, this works really well as we're motivated to do our best, not just for ourselves but for the other person. It also means clients and the team have a point of contact each day of the week.

It's important to both of us that we are setting an example for our children and all of those around us. For our children, it should be the norm that mums and dads can choose to wear a number of hats and contribute to their family equally, but in different ways. What works for one family, may look and feel completely different to what works for another family. For those in our workplace, we want to demonstrate that working the traditional full-time 9-5 is not the only way to progress and be successful. To make a difference, we need to be different and that is what we are setting out to do.

That said, there is no doubt that being a part-time working parent is tough, and there will forever be a number of balls to juggle at any one time. Our advice to manage the load would be:

• Accepting that, on occasion, a ball may get dropped. The key is knowing which balls need to stay in the air at any one time.
• Build a support network to share the load. This might include a partner, friends, family or even outsourced care.
• Find a team at work who want to see you succeed and are willing to adapt the ways that they operate to make that happen.
• Be clear with your team when and how they can contact you on your days off.
• Dedicate a realistic amount of time each week to prioritise you.