Large corporate firms such as KPMG and Morgan Stanley are now seeking out women who left their careers to have a family and who are now considering re joining the workforce. These prospective employees are considered ideal as their skills and knowledge are prized and flexible working becomes easier to offer.

Historically women who left employment to have a child had little choice when they decided to return to employment as flexibility of hours to tie in with nursery and school times was very tricky to deal with. Often women would work evenings in a retail setting or latterly in some sort of call centre, operating in a customer care environment, as these roles were the main ones with flexibility. Opportunities were also obtainable in the “party selling” type roles with the likes of Avon and Tupperware. Again these were attractive to returning mothers as they offered a high degree of flexibility and the option to Work From Home.

There has always been a demand for extra retail cover, particularly in the lead up to Christmas and this again has been an area where women returning to work after having children have found opportunities, particularly over the last 20 years as evening shopping and Sunday shopping has become the custom. But even with respectable employers such as the ones named so far the flexible roles on offer until recently have not been career type ones. They have been simply a way of adding extra income to the family funds and have provided women with a comparatively static role.

With the development of technology and the dawn of the Internet Business all this is now shifting. We see the large firms such as Barclays and Morgan Stanley actually making a definite effort to recruit mothers back into the workplace and not only that, but the roles on offer are at a much higher level than those offered before.

This type of development is due in part to the coming of broadband, offering very quick download speeds to the majority of the country which in turn has allowed remote working to become a possibility. The opportunity to work from home or at a satellite office near to home rather than travel into the city is a big advantage for a lot of women with child care to consider. Local school runs can still be dealt with and the travelling distance to an office is cut out altogether meaning that the actual time spent “at work” is completely constructive and there is more time for family life.

Another aspect of the changing business scene that has offered opportunities for mothers to return to work in high flying jobs is the development of many internet businesses. These usually operate without a definite physical base and the majority of workers are able to work from home on Online Jobs using all the online technologies available and being developed.

It is therefore obvious why the larger organizations are tapping into this rich seam of aptitude, as it offers them with the opportunity to get hold of individuals with a high skill level who require no more than some refresher training to be fully functional. It will be interesting to see if some of the SME’s start to understand this potential too and take advantage when the job vacancy numbers increase following the countries pull away from recession.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 22nd, 2009 at 12:38 pm and is filed under Business and Management. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.