Mums in Tech ft. Jessica Middlemiss
As part of our ‘Mums in Tech’ series, we caught up with Jessica Middlemiss, Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at Puraffinity.
The purpose of our 'MotherBoard’ content series is to highlight incredible working mums within tech & data, as well as individuals and businesses that are supportive and progressive within their approach to creating more inclusive tech & data teams for women.
Firstly, can you please introduce yourself and tell us a bit about your current role?
I’m Jess and I’m CTO at Puraffinity. I’m also married to Ben and we have 2 wonderful children: Beatrix aged 11 and Otto aged 8. We live on around 6 acres in rural Gloucestershire and also share our home and land with dogs, sheep, chickens and guineafowl.
Puraffinity develops and commercialises water treatment media that targets the removal of PFAS (AKA Forever-Chemicals) from water. My role at Puraffinity is to run the Technical function. This is approximately 50% of the business and includes Product Development Scientists, Process Chemists, Engineers and Laboratory Technicians. My team is responsible for all things technical from product concept and R&D right through to supporting customers to set-up their systems to treat water with our media. We also develop the manufacturing processes which are then scaled-up via 3rd party partners.
Another aspect of my role is to pursue beneficial collaborations with other companies and academics to research new areas of science related to our product (like new chemistries or new analytical methods) or to find great applications or complimentary technologies (such as partnering with PFAS destruction companies to prove that once we have removed the PFAS from water, they can destroy it.
If you could sum up what it’s like being a working mum in tech in one sentence, what would it be?
A hectic but very rewarding juggle.
“It can also feel hard to prove yourself at work if you are constrained by those family responsibilities and desires.”
How do you find the balance between your career and motherhood?
I’m not 100% sure I always do, but in partnership with my husband Ben (who is also the father of my children). He also works a busy and responsible job, and we support each-other to manage our parenting and work commitments as a team. There is a LOT of active communication and diary deconfliction.
I find that there is a natural balance between motherhood and work when it comes to mental balance though. At both work and home I nurture and teach and I am a part of a team. The difference is that at work I am defined by what I know and bring to the business as me, whereas at home I am Mummy or Ben’s wife.
What has been your greatest challenge as a working mother in tech?
Finding a way to continue to pursue my (pretty big) career aspirations whilst also preserving family time. It’s often difficult to find more senior roles where you can be truly flexible enough to be able to still do the school runs, and to taxi children to activities and to attend sports day and school plays, let alone cooking nutritious meals, listening to a pre-teens friendship woes and spending quality family time. It can also feel hard to prove yourself at work if you are constrained by those family responsibilities and desires.
“I couldn’t really even see people more senior than me in the business modelling much flexibility, least of all women in technical roles.”
What skills have you developed as a mother that have helped your work life?
An ability to switch tasks really rapidly, mega organisational and planning skills and the ability to set really clear boundaries and say “no” when needed.
When you were returning to work, what one thing helped you / would have helped you the most?
More certainty on the role I would return to, and clarity on the degree of flexibility I could have. I couldn’t really even see people more senior than me in the business modelling much flexibility, least of all women in technical roles. There was a lot of guilt at home about having to put the children in nursery 4 or 5 days per week, but also guilt at work for not being able to stay late, and the worry that people would perceive that I was somehow less committed to my job and that my career progression would stagnate as a result.
Access to more affordable childcare would have made it feel like less of a struggle, and might have made me or my husband feel like part-time was more of an option when my children were very young too, but we were both relatively high earners so for us the mathematics meant that it made more sense for us to both be full time.
“It is definitely possible to “have it all” but definitely consider outsourcing mundane household chores like cleaning, ironing and gardening if you can afford to.”
What do you feel should be the top priority for employers who want to support working mothers better?
As much flexibility as is possible for the business and the role that woman is doing. In reality this can be really difficult for smaller businesses or for roles where someone is in a unique role. Having some kind of core-hours system that is within school hours but then allows people to work at other times more flexibly can be a great way to normalise people needing to work around childcare. It’s also helpful to minimise the need for long work trips, and especially international travel as so often families have very little slack in their schedules to accommodate the prolonged absence of one parent.
I think it’s also really important to have and promote family-friendly policies like paternity leave, shared parental leave and flexible working for fathers , not just woman-friendly policies. If a father or partner is enabled to take an active role in childcare from the beginning, it is more likely that it will continue as the child gets older. It’s true that in the majority of families the mother takes on more of the childcare commitments, but we should normalise both parents doing this.
For larger employers, I would definitely have liked to see early years and/or school holiday childcare provision. If you have a big campus, there will be loads of parents who are scrabbling around looking for holiday care and working with a mixture of annual leave, grandparents help and very expensive holiday clubs. It can be really stressful. Larger employers could consider having sort of “pop-up” holiday childcare onsite to make it easier for their employees during school holidays.
Any final words of advice for other mothers in the Tech Industry?
Don’t allow motherhood to steal your work identity. It is healthy to have your own skills and interests alongside your role as a mother. Start talking about your options and what will work for you and your family early. Have the difficult conversations with your partner about sharing the childcaring responsibilities if returning to work and pursuing a career is important to you, and get really good at being organised.
It is definitely possible to “have it all” but definitely consider outsourcing mundane household chores like cleaning, ironing and gardening if you can afford to, so that those are not “stealing” your non-work time that you want to spend it with your family.
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