Liz Skinner

I received the following submission with the suggestion it was to be posted on Monday for Our Stories, but it didn’t sit right there. I realised it needed to be here in Moving Forwards becasue Liz has decided to be fully credited and plans to share her submission on LinkedIn and at her workplace.

We all Move Forwards in different ways and speaking out and being an advocate for change is a really positive step forwards.

Stephanie Joy Phillips, World Childless Week Founder

. . . . .

This blog includes feedback from women across the world who are CNBC, as well as drawing on my own experience.

Did you know this is World Childless Week? It aims to raise awareness of the childless not by choice (CNBC) community and enable every childless person to share their story with confidence.

Like many people, you might think that childlessness is no doubt sad but not something you need to dwell on. Yet a huge chunk of the population are CNBC. Logically, many of your colleagues will be.

More than half (50.1%) of women in England and Wales born in 1990 were without a child when they turned 30 in 2020, the first generation to do so.

There is, rightly so, much discussion in society of the joys and pressures of being a parent. Yet it feels like our culture has almost no space for the experience for people, like me, who are CNBC.

It is therefore easy for all of us to be blind and deaf to the CNBC ‘community’ because it is largely invisible and silent. This is due in part to the shame and grief that many of us first feel when we come to terms with a life without children.

Here, then, are three things that anyone who is a parent, expects to become one or indeed who has no intention of ever being one, can do to help your CNBC colleagues feel more included.

1) Pay attention to how childless women are portrayed on TV and in films

There are a few stereotypes of childless women on screen. When was the last time you saw a positive one? There’s the ‘Driven Career Woman’, who has fabulous hair and nails, a high-powered job and a snarl for any child who crosses her path.

Or the ‘Crazy Cat Lady’, who terrifies local children from her big, run-down house with cats galore and an overgrown garden. Or maybe there’s the ‘Husband Stealer’, the conniving single woman who inveigles herself into a group of friends and makes off with someone else’s man.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I’ve ever met a woman like these stereotypes! I have plenty of female friends in senior jobs but none that have chosen work over a family. No wonder there is so little space in our culture for the more nuanced reality of life for women without children.

2) Don’t ask if your colleagues have children

This might seem a bit prescriptive or awkward. It’s just small talk, right? But if your colleague has kids, they will tell you. And if they haven’t, they may have good reasons for not wanting to think about their reproductive prospects at work.

They might be going through IVF or adoption. They might be bearing the heartache of realising that they want to have a baby but their partner doesn’t. There are so many reasons why someone may not have children. It is not always about fertility, age and strength of desire to have children.

Even if you mean well, don’t try and solve your colleagues’ reproductive conundrums for them. Saying things like ‘you’ve still got time’, ‘here have mine’ or ‘you can “just” adopt’ is unhelpful. It’s also insulting, because it assumes that your colleague hasn’t already thought of all the suggestions you’re making.

3) Find out more about life as a childless by circumstance person

If you manage a team, chances are that some of the people who report to you will have kids and some won’t. Childlessness is just one form of diversity that any good employer will want to consider so they can get the best out of their team. There is a range of useful resources for HR professionals and employers on the Gateway Women website. The University of Bristol also has a policy about childlessness and other resources for its staff.

4) It’s not a competition: there’s room for everyone

Childlessness is like any other form of diversity. We all have our biases and assumptions about how the world is. And none of us are immune to the assumption that being a parent is the norm. Also, given how hard the fight has been for any rights for working mothers, those rights absolutely need to be protected. But there should be room for everyone to be their true self at work and not have to be braced for personal but well-meaning questions at their desk.

World Childless Week support for being childless in the workplace:

Daily topics 2022 Childless in the Workplace - submissions & webinars

Request for Inclusion of World Childless Week in our workplace calendar

Photo by Hannah Busing on Unsplash