Reports on Women

The childless professional

Roberta Esbitt
Photo: Estelle Grunberg

By anyone's estimations, international architect Roberta Esbitt has reached the heights of her profession.

Before she came to Australia, 10 years ago, with "just two suitcases and her teddy bear", she was one of four elite architects working for the European Commission in Brussels, the governing body of the European Union.

There she built working environments for its 15,000 workers. While she etched out a career, workplace culture and a lack of paid maternity leave contributed to Ms Esbitt's decision to place having a family on hold.

Soon after arriving in Melbourne, the New York-educated architect decided it was time.

"Your 20s are used largely for partying, your 30s are for building yourself a career and then in your 40s you decide what you want to do when you grow up. You wake up at 40 or 41, all of a sudden, you have these feelings that you have to re-evaluate" Ms Esbitt says.

"The problem is that if you put off having a family for your career you diminish your chances." Despite in vitro fertilisation treatment, it was not meant to be.

Ms Esbitt is typical of her profession. A recent survey found that just 21 per cent of female architects had children. Ms Esbitt now mentors younger women architects in their careers but tells them to keep an eye on the clock.

"I think the answer is industry and government partnerships. There needs to be recognition that having kids is part of life," Ms Esbitt says.

The professional with children

Janet Vello
Photo: Estelle Grunberg

At first, Janet Vello felt a pang of anxiety when her two-year-old daughter greeted her father with the exclamation: "Hello Daddy. Bye-bye Mummy." Melanie has worked out that seeing her computer administrator father Mark means it is probably time for her mother to go to work as a pharmacist.

"You feel sadder when you are not together," says Mrs Vello, who also has two sons, Robert, 6, and Jonathan, 4. "But at least they are growing up with the understanding that both parents can work and, in some ways, that's the point."

Mrs Vello works part-time on Friday nights and weekends at two pharmacies in Coburg. She feels lucky that her decision to have children coincided with industry deregulation that meant longer opening times and seven-day trading.

A recent survey found that of women pharmacists, 59 per cent had children. In sharp contrast, less than a quarter of women engineers and architects had offspring.

Mrs Vello says she is not working for the money.

"I love mixing with people, that interaction, especially when you have people who don't speak English that well and you have to have patience and explain things to them. It's rewarding," she says.

Sixty-nine per cent of women in some professions are unlikely to have children, a survey has found.

The Women in the Professions Survey also found that pharmacists are nearly twice as likely to have children as women in engineering and architecture.

The survey, by the Association of Professional Engineers, Scientists and Managers, asked 535 women about work and family balance and other professional issues.

The survey, taken in March and released to The Age, showed that 59 per cent of pharmacists had children, while just 24 per cent of engineers and 21 per cent of architects had offspring.

Pharmacists were also the most likely not to work full-time, with 64 per cent either working part-time, on an hourly contract rate or another form of flexible working hours. By comparison, 86 per cent of engineers worked full-time.

Less than half of the business managers, scientists and computing professionals had children. Average ages in different professions ranged from 30 to 41.

The association's national women's co-ordinator, Erin Wood, said it was the second time the survey had been completed and patterns among professions and parenting were constant.

Ms Wood said workplace culture made it difficult for many women to mix work and family life, with many full-time professionals working an average of four hours a week above the 38-hour week.

She said the rigidity of working hours for some professionals inhibited family life by comparison to pharmacists. who could work part-time and had flexible hours, including weekend and night work.

One-quarter of all architects, she said, worked more than 50 hours a week. Scientists worked longest, averaging 48-49 hours a week depending on their field. The reason behind pharmacists' greater likelihood of having children, Ms Wood said, was as a medical field it had a longer history of registration and stronger workplace agreements. Also, deregulation of the industry meant longer opening hours.

Ms Wood said many women had to make the "heartbreaking choice" either to leave their careers never to return, taking their skills, education and experience with them for a family, or to have a life without a family, which most believed was a right and part of life.

"I speak with women who find themselves at the crossroads of career and . . . family," Ms Wood said. "They love their profession and some have to make the crippling choice."

She said many women's career choices meant they did not have all of life's options open to them.

While training topped respondents' wishes for employer benefits, 57 per cent wanted more flexible hours, 48 per cent wanted parental leave and nearly a third wanted extended leave at half pay.