Unspoken Nanny Expectations: The Impact of Flexibility on Work-Life Balance and Personal Time
One of Super Nanny Certified‘s primary goals is to make nannies aware of all the unspoken ways that they can be taken advantage of. We want to give all child caregivers the tools to safeguard their physical and mental well-being and one way to do that is to protect their time.
Research
In the book, Nanny Families: Practices of Care by Nannies, Au Pairs, Parents and Children in Sweden, authors Sara Eldén and Terese Anving interview parents, nannies, and children with the aim of investigating, “… what we call care situations: the spaces and times in everyday life in which nanny and au pair care happens” (3). They do this to discover how the nannies’ quantifiable work aligns with the emotional labor of the position.
The authors interviewed 28 sets of parents, 26 nannies and au pairs, and 19 children in this process, and with their powers combined, a true understanding of the unspoken nanny expectations can surface.
Nanny Schedules
A schedule is a significant contributor to a healthy work/life balance as it allows workers to take ownership of their time, engage in personal relationships, and create space for activities that contribute to their mental health. When the job descriptions add the term flexible, it is a red flag that they need their nanny to give up this right. Some job descriptions will throw in the quantifier “some” flexibility required, but most just state it blatantly to ensure that the nanny understands that, for the most part, they will have little to no say in how their own days operate.
This mostly comes into play at the end of the evening, when the nanny is exhausted and looking forward to “clocking out,” only there is never a guaranteed time that she’ll be able to leave and address her own needs. This comes down to the parent’s desire for the nanny to exchange her time and freedom to ensure their own.
Buying Nanny Time
The authors specifically state that this is a primary determinant of hiring a nanny as the parents, “… in our study recurrently refer to their hiring of nannies and au pairs as a ‘buying of time’” (36). The parents explicitly state that they want the nannies to take over the mundane chores, the time-specific scheduling that mandates their presence which allows them the ability to be free and have more time to work on their relationships and life desires. With this purchase, they create situations where the nanny is overextended on her schedule which cuts into her time to work on her own relationships.
A nanny named Ellie shares that during the hiring process, she was told that she’d typically be off by 6:30 p.m. but that occasionally she might need to stay later. She states, “But a lot of times, the parents, one of them, is not home in the evening, so then I kind of help out getting the kids ready for bed. So, sometimes, it’s not that I’m done at half past six – it’s more like seven or eight o’clock’” (67).
So even though the employee and employers agreed that sometimes the employee could maybe work a little extra, it turns out that for Ellie and others, it happens, “a lot of the time,” and often last minute with no way for Ellie to make plans. This narrative was repeated often in the other interviews and within my own professional experience.
Nanny Tasks vs. Time
Additionally, the nanny’s “schedule” could state certain hours but be entirely dependent on tasks that need to be accomplished.
The nanny Gloria agreed with the other nannies and stated that, “… the family gradually gave her more tasks to carry out…” and that, “regardless of previous agreements, they are expected to just be there and help out whenever is needed” (68).
This buying of time can additionally be seen through relationship structures where the parents position the nanny as “part of the family” and through goodwill, chip away at their personal time.
A nanny named Irina stated that she used to think that her boss was her friend but then started pressing their relationship bounds by saying, “…she’ll be home at seven and she wouldn’t come home until ten, by which time I’d put the kids to bed” (69). By never being able to take her employer at her word, Irina could never make plans of her own or promises to her family and friends.
Consequences
In some cases, nannies asking for a schedule or even a week’s projected overview has cost them their job. When one nanny tried this, she was fired. “The parents in the family had high expectations of flexibility, both in terms of tasks and hours, and they often did not make arrangements until a couple of days ahead. The parents did not appreciate the nanny’s request for a schedule: she was consequently dismissed” (69).
In some cases, overtime can be incredibly unethical, particularly when the nanny is salaried or an au pair who works primarily for room and board. A nanny named Andrea kept a work diary describing her position and hours and discovered that she was often working anywhere between one to ten hours of overtime every week” (70) which is labor that was not paid for as described in her contracted hours worked in exchange for living with the family.
Some parents seek out au pairs for this exact reason, to which a parent named Filippa admitted. “The nannies started to ask for regular schedules, which made Filippa annoyed. She started to look for au pairs instead; in Filippa’s mind, an au pair is more present, and she felt that this would more easily meet the family’s needs for ‘flexibility’” (33) or in other words, slavery.
So we see that the use of the word “flexibility” within job descriptions leaves a lot unsaid and that omission could potentially place the nanny in a position where the parents pay, or more likely, not pay for her right to her personal time.
References
Eldén, Sara, and Terese Anving. Nanny Families: Practices of Care by Nannies, Au Pairs, Parents and Children in Sweden. 1st ed., Bristol University Press, 2019. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvm7bbst. Accessed 14 Apr. 2023.
