 From New America and Slate, I'm Bridget Schulte, and this is Better Life Lab. I've had a great career. I love being the CFO of this bank. So I don't think the fact that I did it differently has held me back in any way. My oldest daughter, this summer, she was talking to me about how she liked that I was around. She looks back and says, my family was able to do that. I really want to find a way that I can do that as well. That's Michelle Hickox. I spoke with her from the bank just outside Dallas where she's now Chief Financial Officer. Some surveys show that people think work-life balance for top leaders is impossible. It's a myth. But Michelle shows that that's not true. She found a way to build a powerful career and protect the time she needed for her family. And she did it when few of her coworkers even dared to speak about things like flexible schedules or working reduced hours. Her path was often challenging. But for anyone who, like me, struggles pretty much daily with the mix of work and life, Michelle's tale is also pretty inspirational. We'll get to Michelle's story in a minute. But before that, let me bring in Jessica DeGroote. Hello, Jessica DeGroote. Jessica runs Third Path Institute. It's a non-profit out of Philadelphia that's worked closely with business leaders and others for 16 years. She's the reason I met Michelle Hickox in the first place. Jessica is on a mission. Not only to help families better share work and home responsibilities, but to help make the American workplace better. Jessica's seen some big shifts, good and bad, since Third Path started. 16 years ago, when I said this was a men's and women's issue, both men and women really pushed back and said, I don't think men care about this. And I said, well, I don't think that's true. That's the biggest change I've seen. We cannot go through Father's Day and not see a million articles about how men want things differently. I think younger men and women really are ready. They're not having that same argument at home. You know, it just strikes me when we talk about the work culture and how powerful that is or gender norms and how powerful they are to try to push against the status quo. I can imagine is pretty tough to do. Yeah, it's very exhausting. We still are at the early adapter stage. So as much as this future world is possible, right now, today, it's hard to do this alone. Well, what I'd like to do is we had a great conversation with Michelle Hickox, who's been part of one of your groups for a number of years, who herself has fallen off the wagon and your group has helped her see things clearly and get back on. So I'd like to listen to some of the conversation together and get some of your insights. Sounds like fun. My husband and I had kids very quickly after we got married and both of us were in public accounting. At the time we started in public accounting, there were no flex schedules or due and telecommuting or anything like that. I mean, I can tell you the day that I started my job in our first meeting, they basically said, do not plan anything on weekends because you're going to be required to work. So just don't plan anything so we don't feel bad. And so when we found out that we were expecting our first child, we didn't think that would work if both of us stayed in that line of work. So my husband decided public accounting really went for him while I really liked it a lot. So he saw a job with another company that had much more employee-friendly policies and he was able to find a job where he could work a flex day, meaning he could shift his hours and he would go into work really early so that he was off earlier in the afternoon so that our baby at the time didn't have to spend so many hours in daycare. And so then when did you start thinking about working differently? When my oldest daughter finished kindergarten we had an issue that came up with the daycare that we were using which decided that once that school year was over they wanted those kids to graduate and be gone and so it left us with a whole related to childcare for that summer. And the other thing that I had really been thinking about was my parents were teachers so even though they both worked full time they were off when I was off and we always summers were great we spent our summers at the lake that's when we took our vacations and so I started thinking well this is not really very fair for my kids when they're out of school to really have to spend their time in daycare so I started thinking about an approach with the two partners that I worked with at the time to see if they would be willing to let me take that summer off basically so that I could be home with my girls before my oldest daughter started first grade and really my intention at that time was for it to be a one time thing and the way my schedule worked it worked out well for them and for me I took a reduction in pay actually I think I didn't take my bonus that year was how I worked it out with them and I was not as busy during the summer anyway so it was kind of a win-win for both sides. And so it didn't turn into a one time thing what ended up happening? It didn't because after that first summer I enjoyed it so much and I thought well I would really like to see if there's a way for me to continue to do this ongoing. Our firm was sold to Mcgladry at that point in time who at that time did not have official policies or at least in the Dallas office we didn't so I really had to go through that approach again and while the partners that I had originally worked for were still there they were no longer in charge so I had to work out a deal with the managing partner of the office and he was really anti anybody working anything different than what would normally be expected in public accounting which is 50 to 60 hours a week. And really his thought was if we let one person do that then everyone is going to want to do that and what I've learned over my career is that's not true. I mean one in exchange for working less hours I also took a 20% cut in pay which was worth it to me. I really wanted the flexibility and the ability to spend time with my girls but you know a lot of people that's not what they want to do or they have other ways that they're able to work that out. So if you have the managing partner who is really opposed to anybody working differently except this kind of really always on manner how did you get them to change his mind? So I did still have the support of the two partners that I had originally worked for and they approached him and basically talked him into letting me try it. So the agreement at the time was that I would be able to do it but he didn't want me to tell anyone that I was doing it. And I will say that that caused issues and I actually almost gave up on it and decided to look for another job because part of the agreement was that when we were not so busy which was in the fall I would leave at four in the afternoon so that I was home and time to have dinner spend the afternoon with the girls and Rob and I'd be getting on the elevator to leave and these people would just be going wow Michelle you're taking off early today it must be nice to leave this early and that was because no one knew what my arrangement was and so it made me feel like everyone thought well I was not committed to my job or I was not working as hard as everyone else and they didn't know that I had an arrangement and I also had taken a reduction in pay to be able to have that arrangement and so after that first year I was like you know I'm not really sure if this is really working. Fortunately we had a change in the managing partner another partner from the firm moved in who was much more open to flexible schedules and the firm I think at that point in time was going through a change too where nationwide you know it was a national firm and they were rolling out more flexible schedules as well and so what I found is that the more people that knew about it the better I communicated it to people the better it worked. And you didn't find that there was a big rush to the exits that everybody else wanted to work differently or wanted to take their summers off? There wasn't in fact I think while I worked with a couple of other women in the office over my career there I really was the only one in the Dallas office in need to have the schedule that I had. So Jessica, so one of the things that really strikes me is how important it was to have leaders who were willing to try something different. Absolutely I mean I think it still took a lot of courage on Michelle's part to really be the one to kind of step up and say this is something I'd like. So yes absolutely the leaders had to kind of match her and her courageousness and try something out with her but we can also hear is that you know she had to keep on pushing it wasn't easy to begin with and there was some criteria to keep it under the radar and she said no got to make this more transparent. It strikes me you talk about being transparent you know and then when you hear little conversations here and there people kind of whispering well I leave too I just don't let anybody know or I pretend I'm going to a client or and then there was a Harvard business review article that came out not that long ago that basically said people are really good at pretending they work 80 hours so that they look good but right but that you know the bosses they can't even tell who's working and who's not you know so because we don't have that transparency I'm wondering is that part of the reason why this kind of overwork culture persists. I mean I think that's one part I mean not honestly I think what we started to see is that there's just so much ineffectiveness that happens when we overwork and then it perpetuates more ineffectiveness a simple example is that you know you don't actually have time to plan for that thing that's going to happen in a month and then suddenly that thing arrives and you're not ready for it until you have to all crank harder to get ready for it and it's just it perpetuates a cycle of overwork. So talk about kind of what is the current situation if you will the current reality what's your vision and how far away are we in that gap. One of the things that changed over the last 16 years is the double-edged sword of technology became much more transparent so clearly we can really do work differently you know time to care for your aging parent or time to care for your children, time to be involved with your community. Those ideas are really possible because of technology we can do work anywhere anytime but what's changed also is the expectation that we should be available 24-7 now. There's been this tendency to have chronic overwork in the last 8 years and you know there's lots more we could talk about how Michelle learned how to work smarter from this process. So let's continue with Michelle's story. So did that you know working 80% taking the summers off, leaving it for in the fall, did that affect the quality of the work that you did did that affect your chances at rising there? It didn't and the one thing I would say about public accounting or even client service work in general is that at the level I was at you have the ability to your work is determined by the number of clients that you have and so I always had the ability to manage that schedule but there did come a time before I made partner our national HR director was in our office one day and was just talking to me about getting in the partner development program and being promoted to partner and I told her at the time I said I really that's not really something I'm interested in right now I love my flex schedule I don't want to give up my flex schedule to be able to get to partner at this time and she just said you know Michelle that's not really a choice you don't have to choose between one or the other you know you can get the qualifications to get to partner without giving up your schedule and I was like wow you know that's great then that is something I'm interested in but I think I felt like I also needed to talk to my husband about it because while I knew that if I could still maintain my schedule you know just being in that program which was a three year program required me to travel more there would be more responsibilities and probably some changes to my schedule even though I was able to keep it for the most part and so he and I basically had a discussion at that point in time to say hey you know this is an opportunity but it's really a choice we need to make together because I knew having to take care of the girls by himself while I was gone he needed to be on board before I made that decision and he was and you know fortunately it all worked out so I was in the program I made partner after two years in that program and while you know at that point in time you kind of are the primary contact with the clients so it did change my responsibility somewhat I was still able to work that 80% schedule until I left the firm at the end of 2011. So how many years did you end up working that flexible schedule where you took summers off? About 10 years 10 years and you made partner did you tell your clients did they freak out when you said I'm going to be at the pool with my kids in the summertime? You know my clients actually were fine with it in fact they appreciated you know before I would leave when I was not in the office I sent a communication to all of my clients even the ones that didn't have work that would go on that time of the year just to let them know what my schedule was where I would be and I didn't there weren't a lot of clients there were a few clients that I would give out my personal cell phone number two and and that your team was able to handle the rest of it and so that to me was one of the best things that I don't think anybody realized about that was that I was able to delegate to my team and I had a couple of people that worked for me over the years that because of that delegation and getting them in front of the clients and making sure that if the clients knew that I was not there that they were available really helped them to grow and got promoted from senior to manager to senior manager and so it benefited them as well as me because they were able to grow more in their responsibilities and benefit from that as well. You know there was a Harvard Business Review article not long ago looking at a survey of a number of top leaders sort of partners like at your level and the the consensus was that having work-life balance was either it was quote an elusive ideal or a complete myth so what you're describing is something that most people don't think is possible you made partner and you worked for ten years with with the schedule that gave you a lot of time for your family and your life why do you think you were able to do it and why do you think so many people believe it's not possible? Some of it has to do with the want or the desire to do it right I think it also has a lot to do with the people that you work with and the people that are above you mentoring you to support you I think even in companies where there are flexible schedules or benefits some of that just depends on who it is specifically that you are reporting to or who is managing a certain department I think I've had a supportive spouse at home where we've been able to work that out together so I think there's lots of different things that go together to make all of that work So Jessica what's the recipe if you will to make working differently working and living differently work? Yeah well again how did Michelle do it as an early adapter so that's the question she did this a number of years ago when it was really more unusual to do and how do we want people to be able to do it 10 years from now and you know my hope is that we really create a world where it just becomes much more normal we see people around us men and women who have done this differently and it won't take so much courage to do it differently but what you hear from Michelle's story is something I've heard over and over again her clear desire that this is what she wanted this is what made sense we can do this together there was clarity at home so even though they were facing that external barrier of maybe the less supportive workplace the less supportive boss they were willing to partner at home to figure it out and make it happen so I think desire is critical a supportive spouse makes a huge difference and absolutely we are seeing that there's pockets of managers who get it and don't get it so you might be working in a big organization with a manager who doesn't get it start poking around and finding that person who seems to be flexing the way you want to find out who they're working for and I bet you can move to a different place in that same organization and get more support that's interesting I worked a reduced schedule after I had my daughter and I remember one of the requirements was that I didn't tell anyone the secret because they were worried that everybody would want the same thing and I just remember feeling really badly that that was somehow not only was I seen as not as committed but that also you kind of had that feeling you were sneaking around when in fact I did really great work I won an award for a series while I was on that reduced schedule and I had time with my kids and I sort of kept that all under wraps and nobody ever knew so it didn't help change the culture at all I wonder how many other people are like that and I think there really is some risk involved with it there are some industries like law is a classic industry where there's some serious risk to do something differently you will literally not make partnership if you ask to do it differently in many law firms so it's hard so I don't think you're alone that this was hard to do and be public about that's my hope is that we make it less hard so you don't have to be a certain kind of pioneering spirit to do this I want it to be available to lots more people there certainly always changes and as we talked about as my responsibilities at the firm changed as my kids got older that changed as well so in the beginning while it was important for me before they couldn't be unsupervised at the younger age the challenge became when there were things that would come up that I had to come into the office for and making sure that I always had a backup plan either my mother was available or a neighbor or a friend or someone was available to fill in in a pinch for me if I had to be in the office for something and then it got to be it wasn't so much summers but they got into club sports and that type of thing so I flexed my schedule a little bit where I actually worked more during the summer so that I could be more off during the school year leave earlier in the afternoon and so I think that's I think that's one of the things where I've seen people that have attempted this and there were a few people at the firm other women who had children that tried it and what the advice I would give is that you can't just try it and then give up on it really quickly if one thing doesn't work you have to try to try again and be willing to be flexible to see if you can do a couple of things to try to make it work because I think had I given up that first year I really could have given up easily. Sure when we were talking the first time that we met was at the pioneering leaders summit that Third Past Institute puts on with people who are trying to work differently and some with greater success than others and certainly when I went I was not having great success with my own work-life balance and at that point you were struggling too can you talk a little bit more about that so I left the firm to take my current position as a CFO of the bank we did a public offering about a year after I got here and the bank was small I did not have staff in place that I needed to be able to do that so most of that work fell to me and at that pioneering leaders summit that was kind of the end of that year and I really felt out of balance and this was something I had been successful with and at that summit I think I really kind of felt like a fraud because I was like well I've been really failed at this over the last year and so the one thing I found really though was that taking the skills I learned at Mcgladry when I was a partner there to a bank they didn't always work exactly because the work is different and this is a place I'm expected to be all day every day versus in client service you never know where you're going to be or who you're working with and so that was an adjustment and just the workload there was just really too much work for me to do and so really how we solved that was I was able to add to my team and finally have enough people in place to get my life back in balance so the one thing I have been able to do with my skills here is two of the women that report to me have young children the bank you know just it was a small company work-life balance and those types of things wasn't really anything that anyone really thought about here and it wasn't part of the culture and so I've worked really hard to bring the skills I've learned not you know not just for me but for the people that work under me because I feel like you can attract and retain really great people if you're willing to provide benefits like that my financial reporting manager which that work ebbs and flows she has an eight month old and a almost three year old and so I've worked with her you know to get her technology she can work from home if she needs to we actually have a branch that's about five minutes from her house so we've set her up an office there so she comes to the corporate office which is probably a 45 minute commute for her because she needs to but there are days that I get a call from her where she says I just things are too crazy at home I'm not going to be able to make it to McKinney I'm just going to work from Coppell and she can do what she needs to there and that's fine and I think what my staff would tell you is they feel totally comfortable with that because I've modeled it and you know I totally understand it I've been there I think it wasn't necessarily that I don't think he had really ever thought about it so you know we were talking about some employee benefits about two years ago and everything was on the list except there were no parental leave benefits and I said you know why don't we which become personal to me because of my employees and I said why don't we have maternity leave or parental leave benefits and he said why didn't know that we didn't we do we do need to have that and so he just didn't know yeah so I mean sometimes I think just because it doesn't exist and no one else talks about it doesn't mean that no one else has thought about it or is against it so you know that really taught me I just need to speak up and in fact he got on to me in that meeting and he's like Michelle we are relying on you you have an outside perspective and he said we really need you to speak up in those areas because those are things you know we've all done this here for a long time we don't necessarily know that so last thing I wanted to ask you it's like so you you've worked differently you asked for things that a lot of people are too afraid to ask for you actually got them you were successful you rose in your firm you've got this amazing position what is it all meant that you that you made this choice to work differently we know I say as far as my career goes I've had a great career in the position that I'm in right now I love I love being the CFO of this bank and I feel like I I would look back and say I've been very successful so I don't think that my the fact that I did it differently has held me back in any way if you ask my girls who are both in college now my oldest daughter just turned 22 and she has a serious boyfriend she's not engaged but they probably will get married when she graduates from college and this summer you know she was talking to me about how that was important to her that she liked that I was around you know when she needed me to be around either during the summer or school events or whatever it was she never felt like that I missed out on anything she's chemical engineering major and her boyfriend is probably going into public accounting just like I was and so they actually already having conversations about once they are married how to make it work how to share care I mean it's just very interesting to me that they're thinking about that in advance because I didn't think about that until I was expecting her that wasn't even anything that ever entered my mind and I think with her she looks back and says my family was able to do that I really want to find a way that I can do that as well so is there Jessica what do you think we can do work differently and do it successfully and clearly Michelle's trajectory as a career proves that right but not only did Michelle have success at work she modeled something not just herself but her husband modeled something to their children and their children watched them every single day and they learned something different they learned they don't have to have a life where work requires all of you but instead they saw the value of living a life where work is something that you do and you do excellently but you also have time to invest in your family your partner and so Michelle's daughters watched Michelle do things differently and they watched Rob Michelle's husband do things differently and lo and behold kids grow up and so here are Rob and Michelle as empty nesters and they can actually live their life in a really cool way and still have a lot of love for each other a big sense of who they are as people a really successful solution for us and our workplaces for our children for our relationships I'm not talking crazy ideas here this is what's possible for everybody we can do this Alright great Jessica this has been fantastic thank you so much for taking the time to talk with us today You are welcome so glad you're doing the work you're doing Jessica DeGroote runs the non-profit Third Path Institute We also heard this episode from Michelle Hickox she's Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Independent Bank it's a $5.5 billion bank serving North Texas, Houston and Austin I spoke with Michelle from our office in McKinney, Texas For more resources on working healthier visit us online at newamerica.org Click on the link for Better Life Lab Better Life Lab is produced by New America in partnership with Slate Thanks so much for joining me for our podcast about the art and science of living a full life It's a collaboration with Ideas 42 supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Our producer is David Schulman If you enjoyed this episode review us on Apple Podcasts it'll help us get the word out From New America's Better Life Lab I'm Bridget Schulte