It's a valid decision to have children and continue working. But to expect companies to take up the slack, or otherwise make it easier for those making the choice to be parents, is unfair to the company and the many workers who are childfree, and/or for personal, cultural or other reasons have no issues w/ spending long hours away from their progeny. I'm child-free -- where's my parental leave equivalent? And shouldn't I be entitled to flexible hours too, even though my concern is hitting the slopes one day a week instead of PTA or soccer practice or caring for a sick child?

I was a manager and/or executive at 3 different Fortune 50 companies. Yes, it's true - employees who do not seek a work/life balance tend to enjoy more upward mobility - they are putting in the hours, and so are reaping the rewards. In general, workers with families try harder to balance - they want to spend time with their children. The child-free tend to have more liberty/inclintation to take extra assignments, work longer hours and accept positions/projects requiring travel - and because of the resultant higher productivity, skill advancement and visibility are more frequently on the radar for advancement. It's how the world works. It's called making trade-offs.

My bet is that few large multinational companies are ever going to 'see the wisdom' in having more flexible work hours or parental leave options because there is no reason to - for every guy or woman who has children and wants to make it out the door at 5p for his kid's soccer game, there are two or three workers who are unencumbered by family, or unencumbered by any feeling of obligation to their family, to take their place.

In my last exec position there was an interesting dynamic in my department, in which a number of green card employees (2 male, 1 female) were willing to put in huge hours, despite the fact that all had families. They got the plum assignments while some of their counterparts with more 'family first' values languished in the middle rungs of the corporate ladder. I vividly remember one guy - we'll call him Employee A 2 (he had 2 kids) bitterly complaining that he guessed he'd never make manager, because he couldn't put in the hours to compete with the two other guys nearest his ability level - Employee B who was a green card worker with kids, and Employee C, a married woman with no kids. Both B and C really put in the long hours - not because I demanded it of them, but because that is what they wanted to do. They redefined the term 'extra mile' - they liked their jobs, work was the primary way in which they defined themselves. Outsiders might have said they had no work/life balance, but it was clear they were fulfilled by their choice to work hard and spend less time with their spouses and kids than A did. As a result, B and C's skills and visibility were advancing at a faster rate than A, which made them far more likely to be selected for priority assignments. A hated this...he couldn't put in the hours they did *and* get home every night by 7 to have dinner w/ his kids and put them to bed.

I wasn't sure how to deal with the dilemma -- the top execs in my company rewarded me for getting the work done a) well and b) quickly. I put employees (like B and C) with the best experience at working well under pressure in the toughest, most visible assignments; the employees with less ability to deliver as well or as quickly (like A) got less stellar assignments; the capability gap widened. B and C advanced more quickly; bitterness ensued.

What's the solution? More flexible hours and parental leave will only widen the gap between A vs. B and C. For every employee who needs to take advantage of such concessions, there are simply too many who either don't need to, or could but won't. Cultural differences of immigrant workers are a real issue for employees like A - American males are simply further along the contuinuum of seeking more work/life balance than many of their counterparts in East Asia and other parts of the world where the concept of an 80+ hour week 'salaryman' is still the norm.

My advice at the time to A was: you've made a choice to make your family a priority. Enjoy the choice, enjoy your time with your kids. There is reward in that, right? Don't be mad that someone else making a different choice is getting a different reward. You can't have all the rewards of all the different choices - we each make trade-offs. Accept that yours are the right ones for you, or give up what this other guy is giving up (bonding time with his kids) for a chance to grab the brass ring. It's your choice to make.