6 Tips for Returning to Work After Maternity Leave

• Accept that returning to work will feel different and give yourself time to adjust.
• Use your KIT days to reconnect with your role and practise a new routine.
• Have an honest conversation with your manager about your needs and boundaries.
• Consider flexible working options to find a balance that works for your new family life.
• Be kind to yourself and remember that finding your feet again takes time.

Returning to work after maternity leave is always a challenge. The workplace you come back to isn’t the same one you left, and you’ll inevitably have to play catch-up.

And to make it harder, you come back a completely different person, both figuratively and literally. A baby’s come along and made itself your number one priority, pushing everything – passions, partners and professional ambitions down a notch.

Motherhood even changes the way your brain works. Recent research suggests that maternity rewires your synapses. This state of “baby brain” has traditionally been seen as a weakness, sapping a woman’s ability to recall information or think rationally. In actuality, the opposite is probably true.

A mother with “baby brain” is better equipped to handle the challenges of caring for a newborn. They can make complex decisions faster and offer the empathy needed to look after a nonverbal, utterly helpless tiny human.

Sadly, empathy isn’t a sought-after skill in the job market. It also means that while your body’s at work, your mind’s probably still with your baby, which makes getting up to speed on everything you missed even harder.

So, here you’ll find six tips on returning to work after maternity leave.

While these tips were written with mums in mind, fathers and non-birthing partners could benefit from them, too. Because returning to work after parental leave isn’t easy for anyone.

Your job title and responsibilities might be the same, but everything else will be different. Accept that you won’t be able to work like you used to post parental leave. You need to redefine your relationship with work and your colleagues. Otherwise, you’ll feel like you’re coming up short.

For example, if you used to make yourself available outside of work hours, it’s vital to set some new boundaries. Similarly, if you used to be the resident problem-solver, realise you’ll need some time to get back up to speed before the solutions start flowing. Basically, be realistic with yourself and others on what you can (and want to) achieve.

Keep-in-touch (KIT) days are owed to you during your maternity leave. They’re an opportunity to work (and be compensated) without sacrificing your entitlements to maternity pay or leave, although they are limited.

If you work more than 10 KIT days, maternity pay and leave automatically stop.

KIT days are an opportunity to practise a new routine, as well as touch base with colleagues. Think about childcare arrangements and how they might impact your work commitments.

Do you need to start later or work from home some days? How much time do you need in the morning to get yourself and your baby ready? You need to answer these questions well before your first day back.

Plan your routine and test it when the pressure is off (i.e. when you don’t actually need to work). Drills will give you an opportunity to work out the kinks and will make the first day back much less stressful for you and your child.

It doesn’t need to happen on day one, but a frank conversation with your line manager should happen early in your return to work. Talk about adjustments you need for your new routine (which you’ve already practised) and what you can be flexible on.

Being open from the start will help avert any misunderstandings and set realistic expectations. But don’t feel like everything needs to be settled in one meeting.

After your KIT days and practice runs, you should have a pretty good understanding of what you want and can do, but situations evolve. Asking for adjustments as you go is totally okay, and it will be much easier if you’ve already been transparent.

Flexible working can mean a lot of different things: working remotely or adjusted start and end times are some of the most popular options for new mums.

Consider if any of these options are right for you and your organisation. (But bear in mind that any change from your previous working patterns might be unfairly seen as waning ambitions.)

Remote work will give you more time at home, which makes it easier to stay on top of domestic issues. But it also makes it harder to catch up with colleagues and refamiliarise yourself with your role.

If you want to get back to the office, adjusted start and finish times (flexitime) might be a better option. You can agree on “core” hours that suit your new schedule while having some flexibility in the mornings and evenings. This model can also apply to remote or hybrid working.

Compressed hours are another option that should let you make more time for childcare demands while still committing to full days in the workplace. But this arrangement can be highly demanding and will probably be too much in the first few weeks or even months after parental leave.

This last tip might be the hardest to follow: Go easy on yourself. Returning to work after maternity leave is challenging, and there will probably (definitely) be times when you feel like you’re failing at work, at home or at both. Remind yourself these feelings are temporary and inevitable during an extreme adjustment period.

You have rights and protections during pregnancy and maternity. Knowing what they are will help you plan a safer, smoother maternity and transition back to work.

Our online New and Expectant Mothers at Work Training course will help you understand your entitlements and the safeguards your workplace must provide. It covers workplace adjustments and your rights regarding pay, leave and redundancy.