Be a legend to your team.

I’ve learnt something new this year about caretaking.

Caretaking looks many ways: parenting, elder care, supporting a partner, or managing health disruptions. This year I unexpectedly became a caretaker for extended stretches. I scrambled to arrange meal deliveries, grocery drops, extra dog and cat care, and activities for my son (carpooling with neighbourhood parents and asking many many favors to make this work).

Those things can help but they don’t erase the emotional fatigue or mental load that shrouds you when you're going through hard things. At work it still shows up as a lack of focus, shifting priorities, unexpected time off, or simply showing up tired. It’s heavy invisible work.

If you manage a large team and suspect that someone is going through this, here are some simple things that can really change how you show up for them (I know these things helped me):

🌸 Allow flexible schedules, async updates and make temporary exceptions to in-office mandates when needed. Protect no-meeting time, and give people the options of watching a recording or transcript if they are not mandatory to attend.

💐 Make compassionate 1:1s normal and ask “how are you?” frequently. Mean it and be prepared that this might be the first time someone has asked them that today.

🌷 It will be uncomfortable to do so, but mutually recognize the timelines that are at stake. The worst thing for the manager and the person going through it is for weeks to turn into months and then keep rolling. Performance will be impacted and the reason why will become blurred.

To anyone juggling care and work: I see you. You’re adapting, not failing. If you’re comfortable, share one small thing your manager did that helped ✨