The joys of being self-employed

Today I took my kids to a birthday party at 3-2-1 Bounce in Bellevue. (Who hosts birthday parties on Mondays anyway? If I had a more traditional job, I wouldn't have been able to go.)

One of the perks of being self-employed is if my kids get invited to a birthday party on a Monday afternoon, I can take them and adjust my work hours accordingly. However, I was also supposed to meet my husband at the office this afternoon to learn his accounting and payroll system so I can start helping him with his books.

Well, let's just say I planned to leave the party after the bouncing, but A. followed all the kids to the party room and sat down and immediately started eating pizza. I wasn't about to pull him away in the middle of that, but I did manage to get him out the door before cake and presents, or I would have missed my afternoon appointment entirely.

I raced home to drop the kids off with grandma and arrived 45 minutes late to Jim's office. Did I mention I was also covered with smooshed banana? Not a good first impression on a new job, but my husband is very forgiving.

Barbara Rose of the Chicago Tribune recently wrote about a new survey that suggests that instead of opting out of the workplace, "professional women are choosing to stay employed by negotiating flexible arrangements such as shortened hours and restricted travel."

Rose refers to the study from Simmons College School of Management in Boston. She also writes: "An overwhelming 90 percent reported having negotiated flexible work arrangements at some point in their careers."

Surprisingly, "Women who said they used flexible arrangements at some point in their careers were not hit with a 'mommy tax.' Holding constant for age, educational level and other differences, they earned as much as women who asked for no special flexibility, the study said."

Yes, the survey size was small, just over 400 professional women. But the authors theorize that women's careers were being measured against a model from the 1950s that no longer gels with today's workplace.

Rose writes: "That paradigm no longer makes sense because firms no longer promise lifetime employment, and people's personal lives are more complex...."

" 'Women are rejecting the "work is primary" career model and enacting a new "self-employed" one,' the study states."

What the self-employed career philosophy means is that women are finding flexibility in the workplace.

And flexibility is often a requirement for finding a better balance between work life and home life, and sometimes even being able to attend a child's birthday party on a Monday.