Wisdom For Working Mums

Going back to work after having a baby can be tough.  Not only the emotional aspect of leaving your baby for the first time. But the logistics of finding childcare and working out how to combine work and motherhood can be overwhelming.  Then there’s the financial aspect. For many women going back to work full time is financially, emotionally, logistically and sometimes physically impossible. Too many women end up leaving their jobs and even their careers because they can’t find a way to combine their work and motherhood in a sustainable way. The answer for many women is flexible working.  And while the idea might seem like the solution to the working mum juggle, actually asking for and getting your flexible working request approved is a whole different story.  In this episode I interview a flexible working expert Anna Ives from HR Puzzle. In this episode we explore: what actually is flexible working what are your legal rights around flexible working as a new mother? how do you decide if flexible working migh

Speak to any mother about their experience of motherhood and inevitably the topic of sleep comes up. Whether it’s the question of does your child sleep through yet? Or what age they were when they did. It can be a pretty contentious issue. The sleep deprivation that goes along with motherhood can be debilitating - impacting our mood, health and relationships. When we add in having to function at work without adequate sleep then the situation can become chronically difficult. That’s why I’m so grateful for this episode’s guest to be sharing her wisdom with us. My guest is the Founder and CEO of The Children’s Sleep Charity Vicki Dawson. She set up this charity after her own struggle with her children’s sleep as a working mum. Vicki is one of the UK’s experts on the topic of children’s sleep. She’s on the Board of the British Paediatric Sleep Association and a member of the British Sleep Society.

Do you ever feel like your high standards leave you feeling stressed?  That your ambition causes you to beat yourself up for not being good enough or for achieving enough. Do you struggle to relax and switch off?  If so, you might suffer with perfectionism.  It’s a common trait in ambitious and achievement orientated women.  It can leave us holding ourselves to impossibly high standards and it can actually get in the way of us succeeding and negatively impact our relationships, work and health. Michaela Thomas is an expert on perfectionism and is here to help you if you suffer from it.  Michaela is a senior clinical psychologist and a Cognitive Behavioural Therapy Psychotherapist.  She has a huge amount of experience in supporting people, particularly working mums, with perfectionism.

Do you ever feel like you’re a fraud?  That you’re about to get found out? If so, you probably suffer with imposter syndrome.  And you’re in good company. It’s been estimated that imposter syndrome affects a whopping 70% of us. But it tends to hit women especially hard. And today’s guest is going to share her incredible experience and expertise with us on this subject. Dr Becky Quicke is a clinical psychologist who specialises in helping women let go of the anxiety and self doubt that holds them back.  She’s also a working mum.  

As working mums we’ve probably heard a million times how important self-care is for us to have the energy to do everything.  Most of the messages out there on the topic are quite frankly patronising or unrealistic. My experience is that most of us know how important it is but find it damn difficult to carve out the time or space to actually do it.  But if self-care is the answer to us having the energy to do everything we want in life without losing our sanity and wellbeing, how do we actually integrate it into our lives in a way that works for us? Well today’s guest on the Wisdom For Working Mums’ podcast show has the answers for us. Suzy Reading is a Chartered Psychologist specialising in wellbeing, stress management and facilitation of healthy lifestyle change. She’s passionate about empowering people with the tools of self-care to help them weather and recover from periods of stress, loss and change and to boost resilience in the face of future challenges. She’s author of The Self-Care Revolution. In this

Whether we like it or not our success in life is influenced by our ability to sell ourselves. Most women I’ve had the privilege of working with unfortunately have a difficult time with this.  And they’re not alone! All of the research indicates that women are more likely to undersell themselves and lean away from sales conversations. Whether it’s a lack of belief in their value or a lack of confidence in how to communicate their value - selling feels difficult for them. Whether it’s fear or rejection or fear of being perceived as too pushy. Most of us lean away from having a sales conversation. Today’s guest is about to help if you have a difficult relationship with selling. Catherine Watkin is the UK’s leading expert in authentic and heart-centred sales. She helps people fall in love with selling and do it in a way that is aligned with their values. She helps people sell with more ease, more enjoyment and in full integrity. Catherine’s an authentic and inspiring role model for how it is possible to create a

In this episode I interview Vicky Higgin, Chief Information Officer for a global organisation.  She shares her honest insights into what it takes to have a corporate leadership role, which often means she's working across timezones and having to travel internationally, whilst raising two daughters...... and doing a Master's Degree. She shares her insights into the strategies and approach that enable her to thrive as a busy working mum. 

Raising children whilst managing a career, running a house and trying to enjoy life means that most working mums are caught in a time trap. We’re either fighting time because there’s never enough of it! Running out of time, trying to find more time, or feeling guilty if we take any downtime. Our relationship with time can be one of the most difficult relationships we’ll ever have! If like me over your career you’ve probably read every time management book out there, been on a few productivity and time management training courses and tried numerous planning and diary management tools. Many of these approaches just give us a different way to write our to-do list and some give us another stick to beat ourselves up with for not being good enough at managing our time. Here at Wisdom For Working Mums we’re all about revolutionising how we approach motherhood, work and our lives so we can do it more sustainably and without losing our sanity. And today’s guest does just that and I’m really excited to share her an

Having children changes us, changes our partners and changes our relationships.  It changes the way we interact with each other. Whether it’s because: we’re sleep deprived or we have different parenting styles or we’ve experienced an identity shift (from wife to mother, or husband to father) or  being lovers to becoming parents  or just the mundane tasks of parenting consume our time and energy  The impact of becoming parents can be tough on the relationship we have with our partner.  Add in a demanding career, and things can get very tricky to maintain a loving and successful relationship with our partners.  When we have children we have to work harder to keep our relationship strong and healthy.  We have to become intentional about how we connect. So this week’s guest is a relationship expert and has a huge amount of experience working with couples who are struggling.  Nicki Vee has trained with some of the world’s top relationship experts. Nicki and her husband Tony are known at the ‘Relationship Couple’

We receive so many cultural messages about bouncing back after giving birth.  That the goal is to achieve our pre-baby body as quickly as possible.  However most women I speak with struggle to recover from giving birth and many suffer with postnatal complications months, if not years, later.  Pelvic floor and trampolines anyone?! In this episode I interview my go to person for my physical health and wellbeing.  She is the lady that put my body back together after both of my children.  She’s helped me to go from devastating health problems to feeling strong and functionally fit. Beth Gardner from Shropshire Holistic Health and Performance is a Corrective Exercise Coach and KORE Therapist, also specialising in Pilates and Yoga.  She’s worked with Premiership football clubs and elite athletes but her real passion is supporting women achieve full health and wellbeing on their journey of motherhood.  In this episode she shares her unique approach to women’s health combining Western and Eastern approaches.

Do you struggle to have enough energy to do the things you want and need to do? If 2019 is the year that you've resolved to improve your health, energy and wellbeing then the latest episode of the Wisdom For Working Mums' podcast is for you!  As achievement orientated working mums who care deeply about our family and our work, we often achieve all this at the detriment to our health and wellbeing.  This week’s podcast episode is a must listen if: the mere task of getting through the day and your never ending to-do-list leaves you feeling exhausted you have no time to catch your breath and the nearest you get to pampering is a when the steam from your coffee smacks you in the face! I interview Jo Gamble from Embracing Nutrition.   Jo is a Nutritional Therapist and certified Functional Medicine Practitioner. Her passion is working with clients who have complex health symptoms to empower them back to health.  She's the woman who I credit for helping me transform from merely surviving as a busy working mum to t

Every day we are navigating relationships with other people.  Be it our children, our spouse, our work colleagues, customers, friends, family members, neighbours….the list goes on. Unless these relationships are going well they can be a huge source of stress for us.  How we respond when inevitable conflict arises in our relationships can be vital to us thriving.   This week's guest is a world class expert on human behaviour, specialising in communication and influencing.  Julie French is co-founder of The Academy of High Achievers.  She shares how we can communicate more effectively so we can get our needs met and dramatically improve the quality of our relationships and interactions.

This week's podcast guest is a long-time advocate for women's rights, a champion for Diversity & Inclusion in Europe and has a successful job in one of the world's most well known technology companies (his opinions are his own).  He's one of the very few men that I've met that truly champion women in the workplace.     Brian Ballantyne shares his unique insights as a male voice on what is usually a female dominated topic. He shares how his childhood experiences have fueled his passion for Diversity and Inclusion.  Brian explains how he's seen first-hand how women experience discrimination at work.  He shares his perspective as a working father and gives an insight into the work he's doing to help support working mothers to thrive.

Our emotions play such a huge part in motherhood; whether it be feeling overwhelmed, mother's guilt or feeling like we're not doing a good enough job. How we manage our emotions can make the difference in how much we are able to thrive as a working mum. In this episode psychologist, emotional intelligence expert and working mother Sarah Speers shares her experience and expertise on emotional intelligence for working mums. We discuss the common challenges for working mums and her own experiences of returning to work after having her children. Sarah shares proven strategies and tools that can help us thrive.  

At some point we will have to deal with the inevitable but heartbreaking consequences of bereavement with our children.  Whether sudden or expected, few life events have a greater impact on families than the death of a loved one. It could be losing a beloved family pet, a grandparent or even sadly a parent.   Most of us probably feel ill equipped to have conversations with our children about death.  Talking to our children about the death of someone close may be the hardest thing we’ll ever have to do.  Finding a way to do this which supports our children navigate their grief and express it is important.  So we will be exploring some useful insights into how you might do this.

A report by The Equality and Human Rights Commission found that one in five new mums said they had experienced harassment or negative comments from their colleagues or boss when they were pregnant or returning from maternity leave. This week’s podcast guest is Danielle Ayres.  Danielle is a senior solicitor at Gorvins Solicitors working in their Employment Law Team.  She advises individuals and businesses on employment relationships.   Danielle has carved out a niche as a pregnancy and maternity employment law expert. She is now one of the go-to solicitors in the UK supporting working women and mums to challenge unfair treatment as a results of their pregnancy and/or maternity leave. In this episode Danielle shares her experience and expertise on Employment Rights for Working Mums.

This week’s guest is Nicki Seignot who is known as The Parent Mentor.  She is passionate about helping working parents return to work and thrive when they do.  She specialises in supporting businesses and organisations develop mentoring for new parents and returning talent She is a real pioneer and champion in this area having introduced maternity mentoring to Asda Walmart in 2011, where over 200 returners have been mentored to date.  Since then in her work as The Parent Mentor she has gone on to advise, mentor, coach, facilitate, write and speak on this subject across the UK and Europe.  So we really do have an expert amongst us on this episode. Nicki is the co-author of the first business book on parental mentoring ‘Mentoring New Parents at Work’ and is also a Member of the House of Commons All Party Parliamentary Group for Women and Work.

As achievement orientated working mums who care deeply about our family and our work, we are often left feeling overwhelmed.  The volume and complexity of the demands in our lives is leaving us in survival mode.  And it’s completely unsustainable for us and our families. This week’s podcast episode is a must listen if: the mere task of getting through the day and your never ending to-do-list leaves you feeling exhausted you’re trying to work like you don’t have a family and be with your family like you don’t have work and feeling overwhelmed by it all you have no time to catch your breath and the nearest you get to pampering is a when the steam from your coffee smacks you in the face! I interview James Glover who is Client Director for The Energy Project UK. James is not only a World and European Sports Champion. He has spent a decade coaching and supporting some of the world's highest performing individuals and teams to be at their best.  He is also a busy working parent himself. Now in his work for The En

In times gone by we used to have a community that supported us through our mothering journey. But somehow over time we’ve lost this connection to people who could support, advise and nourish us. Though the proverb "It takes a village to raise a child" has become cliché, the impact of our village-less living is having a devastating impact on mothers. I’m very excited to be speaking with an incredible women who supports women in celebrating and restoring motherhood.   She’s one of life’s wise and wonderful women who in ancient times would have been a central figure in our communities.  In this episode I interview Su Barber.  Su offers pre and post natal support to couples, exploring strategies to cope with birth, dealing with unexpected or desired consequences of the journey and offering support at the birth itself.

Ask any parent and the thing that we often want most for our children is for them to be happy and healthy.  But most of us we will, at some point in our child’s life, have to help them navigate feelings of lack of confidence, stress, anxiety, problems in friendship groups and worrying. That’s our job as parents but when we are faced with helping our children with these issues there is very little support to do it effectively.  This can leave us feeling helpless at a time when we need to feel resourced to support our children. In this episode I interview Libby Steggles-Ginn. She supports children to manage their emotions and self esteem and confidence so they can feel happy, free and live a healthier more resilient life. Libby is known as the emoji-coach.  She is an International Transformational Coach and is also qualified as an NLP Practitioner, Advanced PSYCH-K and Mindfulness Facilitator and teaches Meditation.