How Shedding The ‘Working Mom’ Stigma Will Help You Advance In Your Career

Balancing career and motherhood has always been a challenge, but in a time that celebrates women’s independence, you’d think society would be past judging working moms. In 2025, having a child by yourself, being a single parent, and a career-focused mother is more common than ever, yet the “Working Mom” stigma still lingers. Even though over 70% of mothers work, more than 50% of them relayed feeling judged for requiring some work flexibility for their parental commitments. 

One such real world example of this is an experience my aunt had while traveling for work. She received a call from her son’s nursery saying he’d been biting other children while she’d been on “vacation.” As a single mom by choice at 43, she had hired an au pair to help her raise her child while she worked a demanding job as a high-ranking executive in one of the biggest ad agencies in the world.

While she had anticipated having a child on her own would be hard, she hadn’t anticipated receiving critiques from her peers, fellow parents, co-workers, or child-care professionals. 

Aurélie Harp, founder of the Womanity Play Project, a holistic coaching practice that uses improv and creative play to foster growth, said the stigma of the working mom goes hand in hand with the stigma of the working woman in general.

“If you’re going to be a woman in business then you better be perfect,” she said. “We can have it all, the problem is some people don’t want us to have it all.”

This is the crux of shedding the working mom stigma: relinquishing societal norms to form your own. 

Shedding the internalization of the working mom stigma can help you advance in your career by positioning your motherhood status as an asset.

“Stop believing it’s a problem,” Aurelie said. “If you look at my job, I’m doing my job. I show up, I’m present, I make decisions, and I’m somebody that knows how to prioritize.”

She said she believes that being a mother helps women be better leaders. A whopping 89% of American workers agree that working moms in leadership positions make for better employees and 84% admit that they are instrumental in making a business more successful.

Additionally, mothers are better at soft-skills like time-management and multi-tasking. Over 70% of mothers consider themselves proficient multitaskers, and over 65% of them noted their increase in time-management skills thanks to motherhood.   

Not only are you an asset for your employer, but remembering that they don’t want to lose you may help you ask for what you deserve. A recent study found that while 67% of working parents considered leaving their job in the last year, 59% of them would likely stay at their job if they had better child care subsidization.

Some working mothers like Emmanuelle Saint-Firmin, a former Program Analyst for UN Women, said policies have improved significantly since they joined the workforce.

“With effective work life policies in place, women are more prone to a successful career,” she said. “With additional help and consideration from work, we can ‘have it all,’ especially if we advocate for ourselves.”

Katya Rogers, Executive Producer at WNYC, said she fell behind her male peers in terms of salary and title because she wasn’t able to focus solely on her work.

“We’re going backwards at this point,” she said.

My mother, a very successful PR executive in the luxury fashion industry is the reason I believe I can do just about anything and I am beyond grateful to her for having prioritized her career all the while prioritizing me. A Cornell University Study found that young girls with working mothers or working female role models are more likely to grow up to assume leadership positions themselves. Working mothers shedding the working mom stigma are preparing the next generation to evolve in a world where it (hopefully) doesn’t even exist anymore. 

Remember that being a mother doesn’t take away from your skills but enhances them, both at home and in the workplace. It makes you a well-rounded, solution-oriented, “stand-up force,” according to Aurélie, and can help you shed stigmas and advance in your career, guilt-free.