Why bringing your child to work shouldn’t be a crisis moment

What you need to know:

In many African and conservative cultures, parenthood is framed as your personal business, not the organisation’s concern, unless, of course, it’s Father’s Day or a glossy CSR campaign on “empowering women”.

Especially in many African and conservative cultures, parenthood is framed as your personal business, not the organisation’s concern, unless, of course, it’s Father’s Day or a glossy CSR campaign on “empowering women”. In an interview about parenting, Michelle Obama was quoted as saying, “It’s so easy for us to curl up into this protective instinct and not talk about the messy or more complicated bits of our lives. It can feel dangerous to expose those imperfect parts of ourselves. But over the years, I have learnt that it’s really the opposite," which leads me to believe that perhaps the most meaningful empowerment happens in the inconvenient moments, the unexpected school closures, the fever at daycare, and the “Mama, I need you” whisper in the middle of your board presentation. If we can’t hold space for working parents in those moments, then our inclusion policies aren’t working; they’re simply performative.