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SAN JOSE, Calif. - They are known by some as the Opt-Out Generation - women who give up running companies and flying business class for baking cookies and pushing swings at the playground. But when they try to opt back in after their hiatus, many hit a wall of resistance from potential employers and recruiters.
That's a finding of a new study. It adds more fuel to the debate about how women, whose numbers are at a 30-year high in the work force, can blend careers and family.
Women are graduating from law, business and medical schools almost at the same rate as men. But some women see their careers veer in different directions from their male colleagues once they have children. Business leaders and academics worry about a female brain drain - highly qualified women leaving corporate America because they can't or don't want to meld family life with work.
While women leave work feeling optimistic about their future prospects, they often find it frustrating and depressing when they try to return, according to the new study by the Wharton Center for Leadership and Change and the Forte Foundation, an organization supporting women in business. They grapple with skeptical recruiters, discouraging employers, new technology and their own sagging confidence. The longer their time out, they feel, the harder it is to get back in.
Part of the problem is that women often do not plan for the break and do not take steps during their break to brush up on skills, said one of the study's authors. Some expect that their qualifications will still open doors as they once did.
"I made the assumption that women at this level are strategic about their careers," said Monica McGrath, an adjunct assistant professor at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. "But they didn't have a tight game plan."
McGrath said this study focused on women who had professional degrees, such as an MBA, which indicated that the women were serious about being in business and had made an investment of time and money.
Previous studies have shown that for professional women who take time off, there are not "on ramps," clear ways to get back to work. In March, a study of 2,400 women and 650 men in the Harvard Business Review found that 43 percent of highly qualified women with children voluntarily left work at some point in their career and almost all wanted to return to their careers in some fashion. The average length of a hiatus was two years. Seventy-four percent of women who wanted to rejoin the ranks of the employed managed to do so, according to the survey. Among these, 40 percent returned to full-time, professional jobs.
Of the men in the study, 24 percent took time off, but mostly to train or prepare for new jobs. Only 12 percent cited family responsibilities, compared to 44 percent of the women.
The Wharton study, dubbed "Back in the Game," looked at a smaller group - 129 women and one man, most of whom had master's in business administration and who had not worked for at least two years. Before they left their jobs, about 60 percent had profit and loss responsibility at their companies and 74 percent managed others. Their main reason for quitting was to raise children but they also cited wanting more control over their lives.
"Quite frankly, children give you a chance to say, `Wait, I'm going to stop here and think about whether this is how I want to live my life,'" said McGrath.
Of those who went back to work, 59 percent joined smaller companies. More than 80 percent said they took lower positions or at the same level they had when they left. About 45 percent said they were self-employed.
When she decided to go back to work after six years raising her three children, Lara McCabe, 37, a former science teacher, had two interviews but felt she lacked confidence. She is currently earning her master's in public administration. "It's hard to think about going back to work full-time," says McCabe. "Going back to school gives me a buffer."
Four years ago, Susan Minihane, 36, of Sunnyvale, Calif., left a job as a recruitment manager to be with her young children. Now she is trying to find contract or part time work that would fit with her children's schedules. "I think people are turned off that I've been home for four years," she said.
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(c) 2005, San Jose Mercury News (San Jose, Calif.). Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service.
