Work and Family: Getting to 50/50
How do I take the life I have now, which is chock-full, and add a family?
It’s time to innovate how we think and talk about work and family. In this video, experts offer key strategies and frameworks for achieving equal partnerships, so that men and women can better navigate work and life dynamics. “Work & Family: Getting to 50/50” starts with a new framework for making important career and family decisions based on a unique approach, economics! Professor Myra Strober reveals how economic concepts such as investing in yourself, the economics of childcare, and maximizing your well-being can help families plan for the present and future. Then Sharon Meers and Joanna Strober (co-authors of Getting to 50/50: How working parents can have it all) host a casual yet informative panel that highlights effective strategies and tips for communicating with your partners and employers when planning for careers and parenting.
Discussion Guide
Discussion Guide
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Skills Guide
Skills Guide
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Work and Family: Getting to 50/50 Resources
Getting To 50/50: How Working Parents Can Have It All: This game-changing read is set to do for the cultural dialogue around working families what "Lean In" did for working women.
Young Women And Men Seek More Equal Roles At Work And Home: NPR presents findings from an American Sociological Review study that reveals a growing shift away from traditional gender roles in relationships and a greater desire to form equal partnerships.
The Secret to an Equal Marriage? Ask for What You Need: This LeanIn article shows how Sharon Meers began an open dialog about her desires for an equal partnership with her husband early, helping she and her husband find a balance that fit both of their needs.
The Case for Filth: Female breadwinning has quadrupled since 1960 yet the amount of household work done by men has remained largely unchanged since the '80s. Stephen Marche's The New York Times op-ed piece celebrates the more recent trend of women's divestment from household work as a method of creating a more equal gender balance of household tasks.
Behind Every Great Woman Is a Great Man: CEO Anne-Marie Slaughter presents the case for society to respect care-giving men and encourages women to be competitors in the workplace.
10 New Year's Resolutions for Working Mothers: Author Liz O'Donnell presents ten concrete tools including embracing "good enough" and building a strong network of support to increase productivity, happiness and balance for working and parenting.
Baby Bust: Professor Steve Friedman's book presents research to explain why so many young people are not planning to become parents and offers ideas for what we can do as a society and in our workplaces to make it easier for men and women to choose the lives they want.
Rethink What You "Know" About High-Achieving Women: Harvard Business Review presents survey results from three generations of Harvard Business School graduates' views on work and family.
Why Men Need to Read 'Lean In,' Too: The Atlantic presents why men should read "Lean In" so that men can also fight inequality and support women fighting inequality in the workplace.
7 Things Men Should Do At Work To Help Women Get Even: Business Insider presents seven actions that men can take to support equality among men and women in the workplace.
Man Up on Family and Workplace Issues: This Huffington Post article presents why men should get involved in issues of gender inequality in family life and in the workplace.
Men For Equality In The Workplace: Richard Branson describes how men can fight gender bias and support equality in the workplace.
View Work and Family: Getting to 50/50 Biographies
Myra Strober
PROFESSOR EMERITA, SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
PROFESSOR, BY COURTESY, GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS
CLAYMAN INSTITUTE DIRECTOR, 1974-76 AND 1979-84
Myra Strober is a labor economist and Professor at the School of Education and at the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University (by courtesy). Myra was the founding director of the Clayman Institute for Gender Research (then the Center for Research on Women). She was also the first chair of the National Council for Research on Women, a consortium of about 65 U.S. centers for research on women. Now the Council has more than 100 member centers. Myra was President of the International Association for Feminist Economics, and Vice President of the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund (now Legal Momentum). She is an associate editor of Feminist Economics and a member of the Board of Trustees of Mills College. Myra is the author of numerous books. Her most recent book, Interdisciplinary Conversations: Challenging Habits of Thought, was published in 2010.
Sharon Meers
CO-AUTHOR "GETTING TO 50/50"
Sharon Meers is the co-author of Getting to 50/50, a book about how men and women find common ground and share power so that men can be full parents and women can have full careers. She works at eBay, running business development for the new x.commerce platform. Prior to eBay, Sharon was a Managing Director at Goldman, Sachs & Co. In her 16-year career at Goldman, Sharon ran several businesses. With her husband, Sharon founded the Partnership for Parity at the Stanford Graduate School of Business School which supports Stanford's work on workplace parity and a similar effort at Harvard University called the Dual-Career Initiative. Sharon also serves on the board of the National Women's Law Center and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Sharon holds a B.A. in History from Harvard College and an M.A. in Economics from New York University.
Joanna Strober
CO-AUTHOR, "GETTING TO 50/50"
Joanna Strober is the co-author of Getting to 50/50, a book about how men and women find common ground and share power so that men can be full parents and women can have full careers. She is the Founder and CEO of Kurbo Health, an online company developing a platform and tools to help fight and prevent childhood obesity. Previously, Joanna was a Managing Director at an investment management firm where she ran a private equity fund and a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners where she made consumer internet investments. Joanna has been featured on the front page of the Wall Street Journal for her work with many well-known and successful companies including Blue Nile and BabyCenter.
Eva Gantz
MARKETING ASSOCIATE
Eva Gantz previously was a Marketing and Publicity Associate with Cleis Press and Viva Editions, independent publishing houses based in Berkeley, CA whose publishings include Getting to 50/50: How working parents can have it all. Eva is passionate about connecting books and readers through social media, and hosts the Giving Books a Voice podcast and website with free, innovative tips for authors and publishers.
Katherine Brinkman
SENIOR ACCOUNT MANAGER
Katherine Brinkman is a Senior Account Manager at GuideSpark, a technology start-up that focuses on employee communications and engagement based out of Menlo Park, CA. She graduated with a BS in Psychology from Duke University and an MBA from Stanford University. Katherine is excited to be a small part of The Clayman Institute for Gender Research, as gender related issues are top of mind for her, and she feels like there should be more discussion around them.
Paula Kwan
CORPORATE STRATEGY, PIVOTAL LABS
Paula Kwan brings several years of experience within the software industry with a focus in sales, senior account management and corporate strategy. She is passionate about helping companies build high quality mobile and web apps in an agile and lean way. She is also Pivotal Labs' representative into the industry's major platform partners such as Apple, Google, Samsung and Microsoft, and leverages these relationships and technologies to further facilitate customer success. Previously, she was a integral member of the Customer Success team at Achievers Inc., a SaaS based software company funded by Sequoia Capital, Relay Ventures, and GrandBanks Capital. Paula graduated with an Honours BA degree in Psychology and Sociology from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Work and Family: Getting to 50/50 References
Unbending Gender: Why Families and Work Conflict and What to Do About It
Williams, Joan C. 2000. Unbending Gender: Why Families and Work Conflict and What to Do About It. New York: Oxford University Press.
Understanding the 'Family Gap' in Pay for Women with Children
Waldfogel, Jane. 1998. "Understanding the 'Family Gap' in Pay for Women with Children." Journal of Economic Perspectives. (Winter 1998): 137-156.
Part-Time Work as Deviance: Stigmatization and Its Consequences
Epstein, Cynthia Fuchs, Carroll Seron, Bonnie Oglensky, Robert Sauté. 1999. "Chapter 4: Part-Time Work as Deviance: Stigmatization and Its Consequences." Pp. 29-37 in The Part-Time Paradox: Time Norms, Professional Life, Family and Gender, by Epstein, et al. New York: Routledge.
The Economics of Women, Men, and Work
Blau, Francine and Marianne Ferber. 2002. The Economics of Women, Men, and Work. New York: Prentice Hall.
Fast-Track Women and the 'Choice' to Stay Home
Stone, Pamela and Meg Lovejoy. 2004. “Fast- Track Women and the ‘Choice’ to Stay Home.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 66 (November 2004): 75–76, 78–79.
The Price of Motherhood: Why the Most Important Job in the World is Still the the Least Valued
Crittenden, Ann. 2001. The Price of Motherhood: Why the Most Important Job in the World is Still the the Least Valued. New York: Metropolitan Books.