The Roche Report

For the past two years, I have worked from home a lot as part of an increased focus on limiting my travel to be home and present with my kids. As we all shift to an increased work from home schedule, I thought it would be helpful for me to join the chorus of posts on my own tips about work from home. #1 - Try to mimic a workday schedule and workplace environment-- or, with child care being dynamic, be intentional about when you are available for work and when you aren't. The easy answer (if you don't have kids) is try to have an 8-6 schedule where you have a time for lunch and have a time to get an afternoon snack, coffee, etc. It can be really easy to lose structure that a workday provides - and can be really easy to be hunched over your computer for 10 hours without moving (more on this in a minute) - so focus on getting up at the same time every day, getting dressed ACTUALLY for work (maybe not business casual but jeans, nice shirt, etc.-- again more on this in a minute).

Last year, I wrote an impassioned blog post about why getting to equality is so hard; this year, I have a bit of a different flavor for International Women's Day. A couple of weeks ago, I attended a conference where one of the panels (for all attendees) was an interview with senior female leaders in utilities. One of the panelists spoke about the need for men to proactively sponsor junior female talent, highlighting how women and men sometimes have different styles in seeking mentorship relationships and so to be successful, men need to take an active role in seeking out these relationships too. After watching the panel, several male colleagues and I had a very interesting conversation about it. They mentioned that many of the industry events and conferences that they go to have sessions for women in {insert conference topic here}; but in general, the sessions are not open to men. Our conversation then continued about (my summary, not theirs) the perils of this subject as a man