A Parental Leave Planning Framework from an Engineering Leader with an Accelerated Career
Parental Leave Stories and Wisdom from those who've been there...
Hello to all the working parents and parents-to-be out there! Welcome to “Mat Leave The Newsletter | By Stork & Spark” - your place to hear stories, find wisdom, and build community.
Today’s newsletter is a guest post by Chaitali Narla. Chaitali is the founder of ChaiTime, where she coaches mid-career tech professionals to become outstanding in their careers. She is also the CTO at Glīd, an early-stage startup focused on the future of road-to-rail in the US. Prior to this Chaitali was an engineering director at Google where she had an accelerated career journey from intern to director in just 10 years.
Chaitali is here today to share tips on how to prepare for your maternity leave in a way that guarantees continued career success after you are back. Over to Chaitali!
Hi everyone! Chaitali here.
My daughter Saanvi turns 10 this year! Talking about my maternity leave at this milestone feels special. All my biggest career opportunities and top promotions came after she was born. During this decade, I earned an executive MBA from UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business. I balanced this with my role as a director of a global organization with over 200 members and being a mom.
Before you feel like this is yet another do-it-all article, let me tell you that it is not! Trying to do it all is a terrible idea! I’d like to share my tips for editing and prioritizing your post-baby career. These tips helped me keep up my career momentum after maternity leave and beyond.
Planning for maternity leave
During my pregnancy at Google, I was a senior software engineer (L5). I wanted to maintain my progress and aim for a staff position when I returned. The first step was to build a solid leave plan.
Here is my three-phase framework for parental leave planning:
Phase 1 - Delegation
Phase 2 - Tiding Over
Phase 3 - Building Back Better
I applied this framework to my own leave planning. After that, I coached many new moms. They have all successfully advanced their careers using this method.
Let’s dive into each phase below.
Phase 1 - Delegation
Identify which tasks in your job you can delegate for good. Meaning you will be okay if you don’t get them back after the leave.
Now is a great time to reflect on the work you've done for years. Consider what tasks don't qualify as “next-level” for your current position. For example, fixing small bugs or pushing out the next release were “at level” tasks for a senior engineer when I thought about this before my leave.
Once you decide on this work, figure out who you should delegate to. This is your chance to provide sponsorship and uplift more junior members of your team. You can totally get leadership credit by advocating for the rising stars to fill your shoes.
I was the tech lead for a big project before my maternity leave. I chose one of my best engineers to be the interim tech lead. They would guide the project to launch while I was away. Later, the fact that he did the interim role so well was a big reason why he got his promotion. I got credit for spotting and supporting him in this role. This helped me secure a people management position after my leave!
Phase 2 - Tiding Over
Next, you want to figure out what parts of your current work you hope to get back after leave. Start by listing out all the parts of your job that only you can currently do. Now decide which of these you enjoy doing and that can lead to bigger opportunities. Let’s call these tasks Career Catalysts.
For the tasks you see as Career Catalysts, talk to your manager about a temporary plan. Make it clear that you want them back when you return. This is the time to be both selfish and fair. The plan should help the organization function adequately while you're away. But it doesn't need to be as effective as when you are present. This highlights your value.
Here are a couple of my own Career Catalyst examples.
Before my maternity leave, I was running weekly tech talks for my VP’s organization. It wasn't my main job, but I enjoyed it. It let me connect with many people in the organization, including my VP. Everyone enjoyed the content and speakers I lined up each week. I planned my leave by creating a full schedule of talks that would take place while I was away. I also made sure each speaker knew their dates and had calendar entries. I then gave a detailed coordination guide to my coworker who volunteered to run these while I was out. Things went well while I was away, but everyone was glad to see me back as the coordinator. They appreciated the energy and enthusiasm I brought, which my temporary replacement couldn't match.
Before my leave, I had also just started managing three direct reports. I was enjoying people management, and it was a skill I wanted to develop further upon returning. So I told many of my career sponsors, including my manager, about my interest. I asked them to look out for people management opportunities for me after coming back. I made sure they knew that I was doing well in the current tech lead manager (TLM) role by requesting written feedback from my reports. Establishing your credibility this way and also explicitly asking for new opportunities is crucial to ensure continued career growth after your leave.
One last thing to do before you go on maternity leave—write a detailed letter to your future self. Describe how you see the next year unfolding without the leave and baby in your life. My letter to myself was a good four pages long! When I came back, I had changed a lot, so the letter helped me think about my career goals.
Phase 3 - Building Back Better
Coming back from maternity leave is hard. Motherhood changes you. Going back to work like nothing has changed after creating a new life isn’t realistic. You shouldn’t expect that or aim for it.
Here is a 3-by-3 framework to help you take stock of what changed while you were on leave.
Organizational power dynamics
Which new leaders were hired in your management chain, and what is their current charter?
Which leaders left your management chain and why?
Who changed roles among your key stakeholders and why?
Business priorities
What new priorities were added to the business goals and why?
What priorities were removed, and why?
What value can you bring to the new priorities?
Personal Goals
What continues to hold true and what has changed for you based on the letter you wrote before you left?
Which Career Catalysts still apply, and which need revising to fit today's organizational, business, and personal priorities?
What new goals and constraints do you need to account for, given your new identity as a mom?
When I came back from maternity leave, I saw that Cloud had become a top priority for Google. Many new leaders were hired to help grow this part of the business. Many of my strong career sponsors had also moved to this area. Seattle, where I’m based, grew quickly for Cloud. This was due to many large cloud service providers being in the area.
Cloud helped me reach my Career Catalyst goal of improving my people management skills. It also gave me chances to take on side quests, like organizing tech talks due to the many new hires in this area. Lastly, since Cloud was growing in Seattle, I could have a fully local team. This would help me reduce work travel, especially in the first couple of years. It was a key factor for me as a new mom.
Switching from Chrome to Cloud right after maternity leave was scary. But this choice helped me keep my career growing quickly at Google!
Final Words
Motherhood was the best leadership course I’ve ever experienced! As a mom, my best leadership skills were tested and improved. I learned to prioritize ruthlessly and to persuade effectively.
I hope this three-phase framework helps you embrace your new identity as a mom. Use it to grow your career!
🖊️ Note from Kelly - Thank you
for sharing your story and creating a business that helps so many on their parental leave journey!✨ To the readers - thank you for reading and I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in the comments! This newsletter is part of the “constellation community” that is Stork & Spark, which I founded to support career-ambitious expectant and new parents navigate career growth and identity through pregnancy, leave, and return to work. You can also request to join our private LinkedIn group here.
😇 If you'd like to support our mission, consider subscribing to my substack, or check out sponsorship options on patreon.
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