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SINGAPORE: Earning money for the family is the main reason why mothers want to return to the workforce. But they said on average, their paycheck has to be at least S$1,200 a month to make it worth their while.
These are some of the findings from a survey of 1,000 mothers by the support network, Working Mothers Forum, in April.
The pool of respondents was made up of 560 working mothers and 440 stay-at-home mothers who intend to re-enter the workforce.
In the survey, 37 per cent of the respondents said their main reason for stopping work was because they did not want to leave their children in childcare centres or with maids.
71 per cent of the stay-at-home mums said they wanted to work to earn money for the family. But 63 per cent of them said they were unable to find jobs that offer family-friendly working hours.
The Working Mothers Forum, which commissioned the survey, said measuring workers' performance rather than the hours spent in the office is one solution.
Cheryl Liew, vice-chair of a panel of experts, Working Mothers Forum, said: "With that, we will be moving away from having the person physically in the office or in the workplace, to one where work can be done anywhere, and that basically would facilitate a mum to be able to be at home, looking after the kids and yet be able to fulfil her professional obligations."
Working from home is not an option for all industries, but flexible working hours can be. For example, hotels and the service industry usually operate around the clock so they need staff to work different shifts throughout the day, night, weekdays and weekends.
Some mothers have found their own solutions. One of them said: "I'm a music teacher and I teach at home, so teaching at home actually gives me some flexibility of time and I can monitor my kids' work."
Whether it is pay or flexible working conditions, most of the mothers surveyed said employers and the government are in the best position to help them attain work-life balance.
Getting the right work-life balance could help boost Singapore's flagging birth rate.
Dr Daniel Goh, chair of a panel of experts, Working Mothers Forum, said: "A quarter or more of the mothers said they will consider having more babies if they have a better solution to their work and family life balances, and I think that is encouraging and something that we hope to improve for them and enable them to have more babies."
Working mothers said the two main challenges they faced were exhaustion and lack of personal time.
- CNA/so
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