Scheduling time to give birth into a full working day - Women's Agenda

Scheduling time to give birth into a full working day

This is the story of the amazing Sarah Hamilton, a visionary woman who founded BellaBox with her Singapore-based sister a couple of years ago.

I first met Sarah after reading that she and her sister had launched an adaptation of the successful US beauty ecommerce business BirchBox.

“You were the first person to phone me for a meeting,” she recalled as we caught up for coffee this week.

Since the meeting that resulted in an affiliate-style partnership with the beauty website Primped that I published at the time, Sarah has also launched her first child.

In what I have come to learn is typical Sarah-style, she worked right up to the birth – literally unplugging her laptop to have her final scan before being induced.

“My mum kept saying to my sister ‘at some point Sarah has to stop working to have this baby'”, she said.

In the lead-up to the birth Sarah and her sister secured a lucrative deal with a group of investors that will allow them to realise their dreams. But in the middle of the due diligence process, Sarah had to reveal to her future business partners that she was pregnant. She did all she could to reassure them that she could continue to drive the business juggling the demands of a baby. Only a man would ever doubt it.

There was a two-week period of grace post the birth and then the phone started ringing and never stopped. Sarah breastfeeds her daughter while on conference calls and expresses so the breast milk feeding can continue when she needs to jump on an airplane and head to Sydney for a day of business meetings.

Her story is also the story of the birth of my youngest son. I worked late the evening before I had to check in for my Caesarian. My husband phoned me at the office to tell me to go home and rest but there was still so much to do before I could contemplate time away from the office. I too breastfed during business calls. I also took my baby to client presentations, where one client famously changed his nappy while I was speaking.

Like Sarah, I was in the middle of a key business issue at the time of the birth. I had been appointed to my role just two months earlier and was charged with leading a business turnaround, starting with the product. There was no choice but to keep going. It was actually an exciting and rewarding way to manage maternity leave. It’s not for everyone but it worked for me. And it clearly works well for Sarah too.

Have you had a similar experience?

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