JobStreet.com, an online employment marketplace, performed a survey that shows that women in Singapore face difficulties in striking a work-life balance, with 75% of working mothers spending less than 10 hours with their children during the workweek.
The primary concern these working mothers are having, is that they are missing out on their family’s everyday life. 70% of them would give up working if they had the financial means to do so.
Chook Yuh Yng, Country Manager of JobStreet.com, says that work-life balance is the top challenge that is faced by women in the workplace. Unfortunately, most of the women have no choice but to work, because 69% of them need to support their family. They need to plan for retirement and become financially independent. Otherwise, it would be a top priority to spend time with their family.
Other challenges that women have identified is having to look after their kids while trying to build a successful career, the lack of career advancement opportunities and gender-salary gap.
66% of the respondents said that they faced gender inequality issues and experienced unfair treatment in areas such as career progression, compensation, recruitment, and performance evaluation.
One consolation in the survey, was that 65% of women say their spouses and children recognize their losses and time spent away from home.