Ah, flexible workplaces. They really are the future.
Last week, I was caught short by a school holiday child-care snafu. It happens.
I had a work-day packed with meetings and recordings, and nowhere for my seven-year-old daughter to go.
So, she came with me.
Here she is, working very hard at fitting in around the office – watching a video with her headphones on, eating sushi.
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Two minutes later she would be dumping her plates in the sink without washing them and stealing a pocket-full of free tampons from the bathroom. Standard Mamamia work stuff.
So when I saw all the criticism that Donald Trump is getting for taking his daughter Ivanka along to the G20 world leaders’ summit in Hamburg and having her sit in his seat while he nipped out to attend to some urgent tweeting, I thought…
HEY. Hold on one minute there, haters.
Don’t we SUPPORT this kind of family-friendly work environment? Don’t people understand that sometimes, a busy working dad’s gotta do what a busy working dad’s gotta do?
What other explanation is there for why, when other world leaders’ place-fillers are their Deputies and Treasury Secretaries, Ivanka is front and centre in a room of the world’s most powerful humans, play-acting at being President of the United States?
Steady on, now. I am not comparing a a 35-year-old, accomplished adult woman who runs her own business, has a family of her own and boasts 3.8million Instagram followers with my seven-year-old daughter.
My daughter can't do sums, could NEVER walk in those heels, and the extent of her social media savvy is the repeated use of the unicorn emoji whenever she manages to get her hands on an unlocked phone.
But really, despite Ivanka's impressive intellect and business record, she is only slightly more qualified to sit at a G20 summit table in between Xi Jinping, the President of China and Theresa May, the Prime Minister of Great Britain than I am. And believe me, I am not.
Ivanka Takes Her Dad's Seat as Merkel Stands Up to Trump https://t.co/9JGIwZsfxi pic.twitter.com/esqPjYPtT6
— McSpocky™ ???????? (@mcspocky) July 10, 2017
Ivanka is, after all, as the White House says, an "unpaid employee". As she says about herself in that role, she intends to “leave the politics to other people and really lean into the issues that I care deeply about.”
The President's daughter has an office in the West Wing and a title of 'advisor' but no salary, no relevant qualifications, and she constantly plays down her position and her influence.
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So, let's just assume that, like my daughter on Friday, Ivanka had nowhere else she could be that day, and no other place to sit than at the main table, nodding along with the big kids.
And let's be thankful that unlike my daughter, she didn't try to braid anyone's hair or scoot around the room on the wheely chairs.
So back off, keyboard warriors. It's time to say thank you, President Trump, for standing up for working families like this.
We need a hero like you.
Do you think it was appropriate for Ivanka to take her father's seat at the G20 Summit?
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