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Speaker 1: Good morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.

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Speaker 1: Today's tid is to work what I call a split shift.

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Speaker 1: So my kids have never been huge fans of sleep,

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Speaker 1: even when they were babies. They seem to need a

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Speaker 1: lot less sleep than other kids. But many babies and

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Speaker 1: toddlers do go to bed relatively early, and this causes

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Speaker 1: one of the first dilemmas that many new working parents face.

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Speaker 1: You need to put in a good chunk of ours

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Speaker 1: to do your job, but your kids go to bed

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Speaker 1: by seven thirty pm. If you work until six thirty

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Speaker 1: pm and then have a half hour commute, you barely

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Speaker 1: have time to run in and kiss them good night.

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Speaker 1: This evening dilemma can be a challenge for people without

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Speaker 1: kids too. I mean, maybe you'd like to volunteer one

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Speaker 1: night a week, or join a softball league that practices

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Speaker 1: on Tuesdays and Thursdays at six pm. Then you talk

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Speaker 1: yourself out of it because you need to work fifty

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Speaker 1: hours or more per week. But before we start worrying

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Speaker 1: that no one can have it all, I think that

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Speaker 1: in many jobs this isn't the right way to view

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Speaker 1: this choice. You can definitely work fifty hours a week

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Speaker 1: and still have a good personal life. The key is

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Speaker 1: realizing that you really have two choices. One is the

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Speaker 1: most obvious one. You just keep working until all the

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Speaker 1: work is done. Then you go home too late to

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Speaker 1: do anything except watch TV, and then you can feel sad.

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Speaker 1: But if you have a little bit of flexibility in

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Speaker 1: your work, you could instead work what I call a

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Speaker 1: split shift. Here's how this works. Rather than leave the

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Speaker 1: office at six thirty, you leave much earlier, let's say

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Speaker 1: five pm. You get home five thirty. Now, instead of

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Speaker 1: thirty minutes with your kids, you have two hours before

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Speaker 1: they go to bed. This is a much more substantial

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Speaker 1: chunk of time. Of course, the work did not magically disappear.

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Speaker 1: But here's what happens. After the kids go to bed

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Speaker 1: at seven thirty, you hop back on your laptop or

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Speaker 1: phone and do whatever you didn't do from five to

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Speaker 1: six thirty PM. You return those emails, You plan tomorrow's meetings,

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Speaker 1: You finish that report. You stop at nine pm and

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Speaker 1: still have some time to relax before bed. By splitting

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Speaker 1: your shift, you are trading off work time for TV

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Speaker 1: time instead of work time for family time. If kids

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Speaker 1: aren't the issue for you, you can substitute whatever it

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Speaker 1: is that you'd like to do in the evenings, leave

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Speaker 1: the office at five pm, go practice with your softball team,

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Speaker 1: then hop back on the email after you've shown everyone

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Speaker 1: how well you can pitch. It turns out this is

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Speaker 1: a choice a lot more people are willing to make.

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Speaker 1: A few years ago from my book, I know how

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Speaker 1: she does it. I collected time logs from women who

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Speaker 1: had big, demanding jobs and who also had kids at home.

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Speaker 1: I found out that about half these women work to

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Speaker 1: split shift at least once during the week. They tracked.

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Speaker 1: This is how they were able to work jobs that

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Speaker 1: required long hours while still spending quite a bit of

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Speaker 1: time with their families. Since I wrote that book, I've

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Speaker 1: done some additional research, finding that many men do the

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Speaker 1: exact same thing. Now. I know this sounds like working

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Speaker 1: a split shift means you could never relax. But no

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Speaker 1: one worked a split shift seven nights a week. No

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Speaker 1: one even worked at five. But by opening up the

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Speaker 1: evenings after their kids went to bed two to three

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Speaker 1: nights per week, these parents were able to advance at

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Speaker 1: their jobs and enjoy family life too. It really is

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Speaker 1: the best of both worlds. Now, not all jobs can

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Speaker 1: do this, and maybe you work in an office where

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Speaker 1: you can't choose when you leave. But I found that

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Speaker 1: a lot of people have more flexibility than they might think.

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Speaker 1: So if you do have some flexibility in your job,

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Speaker 1: figure out if a split shift might work for you.

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Speaker 1: Maybe you're not sure, but you know what, I bet

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Speaker 1: you some people in your office are already doing this.

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Speaker 1: Anytime you get an email from someone at nine pm,

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Speaker 1: there is a good chance they're working that split shift.

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Speaker 1: You just don't see the two hours they spent with

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Speaker 1: their families before they sent those emails. They probably aren't

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Speaker 1: going to tell you about it either. I wish they would,

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Speaker 1: but that's a more complicated subject for a different time.

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Speaker 1: I do know that putting in a split shift means

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Speaker 1: I can work long hours and still have dinner with

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Speaker 1: my kids and put them to bed too. It's a

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Speaker 1: key part about how I have it all, and maybe

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Speaker 1: it can be for you as well. In the meantime,

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Speaker 1: This is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making

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Speaker 1: the most of our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to

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Speaker 1: hear from you. You can send me your tips, your questions,

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Speaker 1: or anything else. Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook

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Speaker 1: and Instagram. At Before Breakfast pod that's B the number four,

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Speaker 1: then Breakfast p o D. You can also shoot me

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Speaker 1: an email at Before Breakfast podcast at iHeart media dot

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Speaker 1: com that Before Breakfast is spelled out with all the letters.

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Speaker 1: Thanks so much, I look forward to staying in touch.