How people approach returning to work after a break can make or break their financial future.
At any given time, thousands of New Zealanders are chewing the cud over when, if, and how to go back to work after being out of the workforce for parenting, illness, and other reasons.
Added up over many years, dropping from say an $80,000 salary pre-break in a professional role to $50,000 for ‘something local’, as all too many women, and some men do, is huge.
That can happen by going part-time, or as Emma McLean, a careers coach from Works For Everyone often sees, giving up the career to work as a teacher’s aide ‘because my children go to the school’. “Dads never do that,” McLean said.
Plugging the $30,000 into a simple compound interest calculator with a 3% annual return, the step down in salary adds up to $1.44 million over 30 years. Ouch, although the true amount would be more nuanced according to an individual’s tax rate and how they invested the money.
“If you want to maximise your [income] go back as soon as you can, because the longer you leave it, your mind will talk you into a smaller job,” McLean said.
And don’t fall for the ‘I need to retrain’ trick, said McLean. “[Clients] think: ‘I’m going to need to retrain, as a personal trainer, an interior designer, or be a virtual assistant, even though I was a business analyst’.”
Or they get sold expensive courses. “A lot of parents get sold some snake oil stuff. ‘Retrain to become Agile certified’, or ‘retrain to understand AI’. They throw digital dust over people.”
Don’t say you’ll do anything, McLean said. “Go back to what you’re good at and focus on that. I want parents to get paid the most and you’ll do that based on your experience.”
McLean reckons women in particular lose sight of their skills. “Most women think their only strength is organising. It drives me to drink. Remind yourself of all your strengths. When you can talk about them articulately you’re going to create opportunities for yourself.”
The most common request by clients is to work part time. Those roles do exist, despite popular opinion otherwise.
“Covid was a wrecking ball to the [idea] that working from home is watching TV and loading the washing machine. There are progressive employers out there and back yourself to find them.”
McLean has recently published a Part Time Power List of 25 outstanding New Zealanders working part-time in powerful roles. The aim is to smash perceptions that part-time is being relegated to the b-team.
The 25 include Erica Beagley, head of brand and content at Kiwibank, Chloe Leuschke, managing partner at Mango Communications Aotearoa, and Herwig Raubal, associate director at EY.
If you really want to find a part-time job, as many of McLean’s clients do, delete Seek, she said. “Seek will depress you, because there are no part-time jobs apart from flipping burgers.”
Returners need to create their own opportunities and they’ll often do that through their network, said McLean.
“Who is your network? ‘Oh, well, my son’s football coach works at BNZ in the finance department’. Text him. Ask him, ‘can I come up and have a coffee with you, because I’m looking to get a job’.”
McLeans’ next tip is to know your pitch. “Practice saying things like: ‘Hey, I’m ready to get back to paid work. I am best at solving problems for customers. I’m really detail oriented. I love working in a team and I love working on priority areas of the business’. If you can have a little pitch like that, you’ve got them.”
There are lots of ‘don’ts’ in McLean’s advice. “Don’t take a junior product manager role, when you were a group product manager.”
Also don’t take a pay cut, that’s accepting the motherhood penalty for being out of work. McLean tells her clients to ask for more money than they earned when they left the industry. Salaries have risen heaps since 2019.
