Babies on Board
Roxanne Conlin still remembers how it
felt, leaving her first child with a babysitter
when the infant was only one week old. It
was 1966. There were few women in the law
and even fewer in practice after having children.
Conlin was finishing her last year of law
school and had a job with a small firm that
offered no maternity leave. "It was horrible,"
she says. "I cried every single day."
When Conlin started her own firm in
1991, she swore that the women who
worked for her would not have to play out
that same wrenching scene. Today, Roxanne
B. Conlin and Associates, a Des Moines-
based plaintiffs firm, is one of only a handful
of firms in the country that allows parents
to bring their babies to the office. This is not
on-site day care; it is full-time parenting in
the workplace. Over the last 18 years, Conlin's
firm has had 20 "office babies."
There is no rule about how long a child
can come to the office, but most go to day
care at about age 1. Conlin says day care
may be good for toddlers, but the first year
is for bonding between parent and baby.
"There is just no substitute for being held
in your father's or mother's arms," she says.
Conlin runs a small shop. She is the sole owner, backed by one other lawyer and a
dozen legal staff. But anyone who thinks
that babies can interfere with major litigation
should talk to Microsoft Corporation.
Conlin's firm won a $180 million settlement
from the software giant in 2007 after
three months of trial and earned an additional
$75 million in legal fees, an Iowa
state record. Sibling publication The National
Law Journal has named her one of the ten most influential women attorneys
in the country.
She calls herself an evangelist, but few
big firms have asked to hear Conlin's good
news. Alston & Bird, Arnold & Porter, and
Sullivan & Cromwell provide some on-site
day care. But Carla Moquin, president of
the nonprofit Parenting in the Workplace
Institute, says that employers are deeply
skeptical about the notion that filing briefs
and filling bottles are compatible. After all,
it's a challenge just to eat and shower with
a baby in the house, so how can one function
at the office with junior's bouncy seat
on the desk?
Conlin understands that reaction, but
says it's uninformed. In her experience,
parents are so happy to keep their kids
nearby that they are motivated to perform
at the top of their game. And because they
aren't constantly worrying whether their
child is being fed or changed, they are better
able to focus. Parents have the baby in
their office or by their desk throughout the
day, with colleagues readily available to
babysit during meetings or calls.
Amy Hernandez, a former law clerk,
had her baby on hand when she drafted
the response to a summary judgment motion
in a sprawling fraud case. She was
working ten hours a day; her baby either
slept in the office or was carried in a sling.
Rather than feeling burdened, she was
thankful. "[Conlin] never made me separate
from my baby," says Hernandez. "I
would have walked on hot coals for that
woman."
Not only is this arrangement good for
parents, Conlin says, it's good for the office
as a whole. Babies relieve tension and offer
much-needed distraction. They also elicit
good behavior from adults in the room-
even opposing counsel. Tiffany Klosener,
a senior attorney with Conlin's firm for six
years, routinely had her baby with her during
conference calls and depositions. If he
fussed, someone in the office would hold
him until she was done. But, she says, a
little cooing in the background often kept
the dialogue civil. "It's harder to be aggressively
adversarial with someone who has
her child there," says Klosener.
This arrangement doesn't work in every
case, however. A decade ago, when Conlin
started the firm, she had a young receptionist
who abused the opportunity to bring
her baby to work by leaving the child with
other staff members to care for him all day.
Conlin says that failure taught her that success
requires constant multitasking. The
next receptionist she hired, who brought
two of her kids, can feed a baby with one
hand and type with the other.
For Conlin, the greatest benefit of allowing
babies in the office is that it has allowed
her to keep talent. Deborah Epstein
Henry, president of Flex-Time Lawyers, a
work/life consulting firm, says the months
after maternity leave are crucial: "If you
can respond in the vulnerable time with
a creative solution, it might carry women
through."
The turning point for Shelly Johnson,
Conlin's longtime discovery manager, came
after her twins were born in 1991. This was
during the asbestos litigation boom, and
she was the resident expert in those filings.
But with two other kids already, child care
was an issue. She and Conlin worked out a
schedule that let Johnson bring her twins
to work in the evenings, once her husband
was home with the older children. "It allowed
me not to have to make that choice
between staying at home with my children
and having a career," says Johnson. "I can
have both."
