Dads have made a concerted effort to spend more time with their children than ever before. I am sure most of us remember our grandfathers leaving for work at the same time every day of their life, while mothers and grandparents took up the children’s duties.
Famous songs such as Daddy Cool, Papa Kehtein Hai, Cats in the Cradle, and others feature father figures that are exceedingly cool and only appear when it’s time to have fun. Fathers have always made it a point to serve their children with the best and to work extra hard to provide them with the best of everything, despite the fact that children when they grow up are heard complaining, ‘My father gave me everything, he thought he’d buy my love with all his money’.
During a few interviews with top CEOs, they stated that their main regret is that they haven’t seen their children grow up since they were too busy making money and growing the empire to support the family. One of the CEO’s said “Afterwards I got hundreds of emails: Not a single person remembered the terrific speech I gave, but everybody remembered I went home for my daughter,” “It brought home to me how powerful leading by example is. You can have all the initiatives you want saying you can have flexibility, but until some of the real leaders make the choice to choose family, I don’t think people feel like they have real permission to do it.”
Things are different now; I’ve personally witnessed fathers intentionally making time to pick up and drop off their children at school before leaving for work, spending time with their families over supper, or going to the mall on Sundays to watch their children play. I know a CEO who has passed up social networking possibilities for company simply because it was his son’s exams, and while he wasn’t teaching the kid, he wanted to be there for moral support.
You see LinkedIn postings from executives who are incredibly proud parents, putting a post on their wall with a family photo stating, “This is my son, and I am very proud of him.” Fathers are much more open to their children’s opinions about them, or at least to hearing them out on what they truly want to make of themselves, as opposed to the past, when the family used to pressure the children to become what suited their social status, and as a result, we saw many engineers quit and go into media communications or become poets, which is now completely acceptable.
In fact, dads have stepped up to the point where there is role play as parents, while moms have upped their game in terms of job advancement, with fathers refusing promotions after promotions in order to keep the child near to him.
Work-life balance is key in a happy household and thriving lifestyle. Sometimes CEOs takes client calls in between cooking breakfast or dinner or in between holes on the golf course, but ultimately, he is trying to make the most of his time with his family. we all hope our children find a way to be successful in life by allocating as much time with family as possible while still being successful in their jobs.
