Microsoft vs The Family

Daniel Petre was until recently, a rising star at the world’s largest company, Microsoft. In 1988 he was made managing director of Microsoft Australia, and later moved to Seattle to become a general manager and then vice-president of Microsoft.

It was in the States that he became embedded in a work culture which demanded enormous amounts time in the name of ‘dedication" and "commitment." In Daniel’s mind the company expected its employees to be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Routine meetings were often called before 8am in the morning, or after 5 pm in the afternoon, and even on weekends. Indeed, he would often arrive at work to find some employees in his group asleep in sleeping bags under their desks, proud that they needed only a few hours sleep before embarking on their next days work.

Of course, employees received rich financial rewards – good salaries, the best health insurance schemes, subsidised cafeterias, stock options, high quality offices, lavish social functions.

The birth of his first child in 1989 found Daniel increasingly torn between "doing the right thing at work" – attending late-night meetings and weekend work retreats – and his deep seated belief that he should be spending time with his wife and children. Then in 1992 his only sister was killed in a car accident. It was a cruel wake-up call, making Daniel realised he needed to get his priorities straight. He wanted to invest his time and energy in work, family, friends and the community in the best possible way. He left Seattle and the demands of a Microsoft vice-presidency and returned to Australia and a 40 hour a week job with Microsoft’s Asia Pacific group. Since then he’s dropped his work commitments down to 30 hours a week to allow time for study without encroaching upon time with his family.

When he returned to Australia in 1993 Daniel hoped to find a work culture different to the US. Unfortunately he didn’t. Instead he found men who claimed that their families came first, yet spent the far greater part of their energy on work.

Daniel suggests some basic rules for executive dads:

• Don’t arrange meetings before 8.30am or after 5pm
• Don’t take work home if at all possible
• Attend lunch and evening functions only if they have a direct business benefit
• Do canteen duty, reading class or some other activity at your child’s school at least once a term
• Write the dates of your children’s school concerts and other events as appointments in your diary
• Try to find employment with a company in which the chief executive and your boss understand the importance of family life.

Source; Scott Higgins. Information derived from the Good Weekend magazine, Sydney Morning Herald, June 27, 1998.

Applications: work, job, family