CCH shares results of a study by the Center for Creative Leadership and Clark University about "how managers' commitment to marriage, children or both affected their life satisfaction, career satisfaction and work performance." The most interesting finding was that working parents are actually more effective at work than their peers.

This is not a big study. There were only 347 respondents in all. Only 221 were parents. But it is significant because the measure of whether those parents are effective at work is provided by their bosses, peers and subordinates.

It seems to me that, in order to be effective, working parents need to be able to deal with the emergencies that being a parent involves. One of my daughters, for example, broke a different bone on the first day of school in three successive years.  Then there are the more routine emergencies like high fevers and persistent colds, and the time-sink activities like dance recitals, basketball games and field trips.

The support can come from the other spouse, from family or community, from purchased services and from the employer. The employer part usually involves giving the worker flexibility to deal with emergencies and competing schedules.

But why might working parents be more effective at work? My guess is that part of the answer is that some of the same skills that you need to be a good parent and to be a good manager.

You need to set priorities.  You need to communicate expectations, monitor behavior, constructively confront and correct.  And, as a parent, you learn that you have influence, but not control. If you're lucky, you learn that you have a lot of influence.

Your children and the people who work for you really pay attention to what you say and do.  Many parents find that out when a very young child uses a word that the parents use regularly, but don't want their child to use.  "Oh HIT!" said young Debbie one day.

What you say and do matters to your children and to the people who work for you. That's your behavior, the most potent tool you have to influence the behavior and performance of others, at home or at work.

There's one more thing that I think leads working parents to be effective at work.  It's well phrased in an old adage: "When you need something done, give it to a busy person."


Resources for Working Parents

Business Week has a Working Parents blog.

Sue Shellenbarger's Work and Family column in the Wall Street Journal deals with working parent issues.

And the Journal even has a blog called "The Juggle" about the choices and tradeoffs people make juggling work and family.

Wally Bock has helped people learn to be great bosses for more than a quarter century. His latest book, Performance Talk: The One-on-One Part of Leadership, makes learning key leadership principles almost effortless by teaching through a story and providing lists of resources for further growth.

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