Ten years ago an amazing man asked me a question that changed my life. No, it wasn’t my husband proposing to me—though it was a proposal of sorts. Ten years ago I was asked by a man I admire and respect if I would work with him. He specifically said that he wanted me to work with him, not for him. It was important to him that distinction was made. I had been working in finance for the previous ten years and was open to a new challenge. He worked in financial advising and wanted to recruit me to his team. I think he was as surprised as I was when I took the leap and said yes.
True to his word I was always treated as an equal by him. The trust and responsibility he gave to me made me feel smart and capable. I thrived as a member of his team because I was empowered to think for myself. He believed deeply in putting family first. We worked hard but he always encouraged me to take time for my family. He taught me the value of going to the game, being a chaperone, and leaving my laptop at home when I was on vacation (that’s what teams are for, he’d remind me). I always knew he meant what he said when it came to family first because I watched how he prioritized his wife and children. He taught me by example how to balance (as much as one can) home life with work life.
Two years after working on his team, his partner who wasn’t so crazy about having an opinionated strong woman on his team gave my partner an ultimatum: him or me. I think his former partner was just as shocked as I was when he let him know that he was going to be his former partner. After the split my then boss asked me to become his partner. It still chokes me up (truth time: I’m not choked up I am literally crying as I am writing this) that my partner took such a chance on me. He gave me a life-changing opportunity. He took a chance on a newbie to the field that was beyond generous and quite frankly not typical (only 20% of financial advisors are women).
Our partnership since then has been a flat out success. And we’ve grown our team in a way that reflects our values. When our client associate’s mother was dying we told her she could work out of state remotely while she took care of her mom. When a new financial advisor we hired, showed up for his very first day of work my partner and I sent him home immediately after we found out his wife was in the hospital with pregnancy complications (baby and mom are fine, not to worry). My partner and I didn’t even have to look at each other, we both told made it clear that he needed to be at the hospital supporting his wife.
When I told my partner that I was going to write about him being the best boss ever had he said that was fine as long as I didn’t call him my boss. I want to scrape his skin cells and clone him. But at the very least I’d like him to write a book teaching other bosses the right way to support working mothers. Because more bosses need to recognize that by supporting working mothers they are creating an army of devoted employees. I’d take a bullet for my partner. And the tradeoff of utter devotion must be worth giving us moms some flexibility, understanding and the occasional day off to chaperone the field trip to the zoo.
