Young moms hone skills for return to ‘paid’ jobs

Rather than view their time away from paid employment to rear young children as a negative to be overcome, the director of the Office of Human Resources for the Archdiocese of New Orleans said mothers returning to the workforce probably have gained wonderful insights and time management skills that will serve them well in their new jobs.

“There are things that they have done like running the household or being really good at time management or doing the budget or the purchasing for the family,” said Beth Tinto, the archdiocesan human resources director. “I think that’s a plus.”

The Archdiocese of New Orleans employs about 6,000 persons, making it one of the largest private employers in the Greater New Orleans area. About 75 percent of archdiocesan employees are women, Tinto said, spread throughout jobs at schools, parishes and social service agencies.

Get computer-ready

Tinto’s suggestion to women who are heading back to the work force after taking some time off to rear their children is to bone up technological skills and to be up front with prospective employers about what they have done while they were not working outside the home.

“They should always be truthful, especially if you took time out from the workforce to raise a family,” Tinto said. “During that time, you may have volunteered at your child’s school, and that’s a good thing. I would also make sure that I kept up on the skills of my profession. Certainly, there is no shame in saying this is what you did.”

One of the questions Tinto likes to ask when she interviews individuals for a position is what they would do when faced with a certain, real-life situation.

“How have you handled this in the past, and how would you handle it when you’re working?” Tinto said. “You can apply your prior experience. It’s important that people who are going back into the workforce look at how their skills apply in the workplace.”

When Tinto was helping to interview candidates for the position of associate director of the Office of Worship, she spoke with Betty-Ann Hickey, who was working in positions at two different parishes in the Diocese of Fall River, Mass., and the Diocese of Providence.

Looking for a liturgy role

Hickey, 32, was music director at Holy Trinity Parish in Fall River and was director of religious education for St. Vincent de Paul Parish in Coventry, R.I. But with her son James now 7, Hickey was looking for something full-time as a liturgist, and she spotted the New Orleans ad on a diocesan Web site.

“After my son was born, I was down to working part-time and I did music ministry and cut back my schedule to basically one choir rehearsal a night and then the weekend stuff, and the weddings and funerals,” Hickey said. “He started in preschool when he was 3. My original plan wasn’t to put him in preschool, but his being an only child and not having kids his age, he needed to get out and have interaction. That’s when I needed to get back into full-time ministry.”

Her DRE position was full-time, but Hickey always had dreamed of becoming a full-time liturgist, which was more suited to her educational background.

“This is where I feel called,” Hickey said. “When I saw the position I thought I would throw my name in, and it was scary because it meant packing up the family. After a lot of deliberation with my husband, we determined that this is where God wants us to be.”

Employers like energy

Tinto said she appreciates the enthusiasm of people who want to return to work with passion.

“I would tell a mom who’s coming back into the workforce to just be really positive and enthusiastic, both about what she has done and about what she is looking forward to doing,” Tinto said. “Employers want enthusiasm and ideas. Women should be ready to answer specific questions about how they would handle certain situations and apply their life experiences to their job.”

Mom knows best

Tinto grew up in a family of nine children and still uses some of her mother’s homespun wisdom when dealing with conflicts on the job.

“I got some of my best management advice from my mom,” she said. “Sometimes when I’m talking to an employee and explaining, ‘This is what you did wrong,’ the person will say, ‘Well, so and so also did that.’ And then I’ll say, ‘So and so isn’t here right now, and I’m talking about you.’ My mom would do that all the time.”

Computer skills are “taken for granted” in the business world, Tinto said, so anyone looking for a position should be as technologically advanced as possible.

It didn’t hurt that Hickey interviewed for her job as associate director of worship in February, when a series of winter blizzards had dumped foot after foot of snow outside her Massachusetts home, and she could actually see green grass in New Orleans.

“We had just come off one of the worst winters of our lives,” Hickey said. “Each snowfall could be counted in feet. I had snow banks over my head.”

Got to work quickly

When Hickey started her new job in August, she knew that the uncertain health of Archbishop Philip Hannan would make it necessary to make quick preparations for his funeral. She will remember that whirlwind experience for the rest of her life.

“I made it a point to get myself as familiar as I could with the archdiocese and with what was going on in the archdiocese so that I could feel as though I was not sitting here as an outsider,” Hickey said. “I wanted to feel as though this was my archdiocese, even though I may have been here only two weeks or 15 weeks.”

As for her role in the historic funeral, Hickey said she came away “honored and humbled” by the amount of responsibility she was given by Msgr. Ken Hedrick, the director of the Worship Office, and by Archbishop Gregory Aymond.

“It’s an incredibly humbling feeling to realize that you’re part of something that is part of history, even though in the end this is never going to be about me and no one knows I’m here,” Hickey said. “It’s about liturgy, and it’s always about giving thanks to God for Archbishop Hannan.”

Peter Finney Jr. can be reached at pfinney@clarionherald.org.