There has been a lot of talk lately about women and negotiation in the workplace. But I want to point out that the most important negotiation women need to do is actually on the home front. The greatest inequality between men and women is in the home, not in the work place. Full time working women still put in DOUBLE the number of hours in the home than men do! (Cooking, grocery shopping, laundry, cleaning the house, supervising the kid’s homework…) So if you want to earn your worth, you have to contend with the dreaded “second shift”.

When I increased my own work hours, I sat down with my hubby and had a talk. We negotiated the dinner schedule. He now cooks dinner three nights and I cook dinner three nights. (We seem to wing Saturday.) This really frees up my energy and allows me to work more effectively. We also had a talk about homework—who was supervising it etc.

Do you need to sit down and negotiate some things on the home front? Here is a four minute TV interview I did for women re-entering the workforce where I discussed this. (Go to the Press Room at www.womenearning.com if you have trouble with the link.)