Based in the north inner-city, Mums Hub supports parents to get back to paid, and more flexible, work

A few years ago, when Karla Dragić was at home breastfeeding her baby, she also wrote a children’s book. 

“That was about my cat, while I had my craft business, and he was my shop security cat,” Dragić says. 

Unfortunately, by the time she published the book, Bongo the Shop Security Cat, Brexit changes had kicked in, which caused complications with tariffs and shipping, she says.  

Dragić is sitting on a bench at the Blessington Street Basin fountains on Tuesday, as her now-four-year-old son excitedly feeds rice to the pigeons.

After that, she figured she needed to get a real job, she says. “I did the digital marketing course, and then I started a virtual assistant business,” says Dragić.

She was determined to regain her financial independence, but it was really difficult to find work that fitted around looking after her son, she says.

“In September, when my son started pre-school, I wanted to do something with those two and a half hours that I had,” says Dragić. “So I kept looking at different jobs, but there was nothing there.”

And that is how she came up with the idea for Mums Hub, an initiative to support parents to get back into the workforce. 

“For many mothers, the issue is not a lack of ambition,” says Dragić, “it is wanting to work without being absent from their children’s everyday lives.”

The solution, as she sees it, is for more employers to offer flexible hours so mums can work while kids are in pre-school or school. She has already found some employers to work with, who that kind of arrangement works for. 

A huge talent pool

Dragić says she used to follow online chats where mums were brainstorming on how to make money from home. 

Lots of people suggested they start selling used clothing on Vinted, she says. They were well-intentioned, but there are so many problems with that, says Dragić. 

“It's a ton of work,” she says. “Where's your PRSI, where's your job security?” 

There are many people with talent, skills and energy stuck at home. “There is this huge talent pool,” she says. 

“I have mums who were in senior positions. I have mums who were in entry-level positions,” she says. “I have mums who upskilled during their motherhood journey while they were at home with kids.”

Dragić says that while the initiative is called Mums Hub, she is also open to working with fathers who stayed at home with kids and are looking to get back to work. 

For parents who have childcare responsibilities, they are often not counted as unemployed for job-seekers’ benefits, she says, so they cannot use the back-to-work supports available through Intreo.

Some European countries are more advanced in assisting mums get back to work, she says. For example, in Germany, every child has a right to a childcare place from age one.

In the Netherlands and Austria, there is a culture of job sharing, she says. 

Preparing people

Confidence can be an issue for people preparing to go back to paid work, says Dragić, so she also runs confidence-building programmes as part of Mums Hub. 

“I'm going to work with mums to get them ready for work so that they have their CVs updated,” she says. “We will have mock interviews so that they're more confident to attend interviews.”

The Mums Hub website is also packed with resources for mums who are working managing the home, and want to get back into paid work – including information about childcare, pension contributions, and how to describe the work they did in the home. 

“I just get relief from being a busy mum, and then the next child comes and then again, I’m a busy mum,” says Olga Barinova, who has three children aged between five and 14. 

Barinova worked outside of the home before, but that was more than 14 years ago, she says. When her youngest started school, “I thought it's time to come out of my shell,” she says, in the Royal Canal Bank playground on Tuesday. 

Before she started looking for a job, she trained in payroll, she says. She is looking for jobs in administration and would like to start back part-time, she says if possible. “It is not easy,” she says. “I’ve been looking since September.”

A friend recommended she talk to Dragić. “I’m very happy to be part of Mums Hub because she is organising a lot of confidence-building,” she says. “I understand now that I’m not the only one in the same situation.”

Some friends have seen her posting about Mums Hub and asked her how to join too, she says. “You can just send your CV and be part of it,” says Barinova. 

It is great that some employers are coming on board, she says. “It's doing something important for all women,” she says. “It’s always mum who has to put down her ambitions.”

“We want to be a part of a society,” she says. 

Dragić says it is totally free for mums to sign up. She did a crowdfunder to get started, and Dublin City Council matched the funds she raised, which covered the website, as well as bits like insurance and phone bill, she says. 

The North East Inner City Taskforce is funding the confidence building course she is running for the mums, she says. 

Employer’s blueprint

Wellbeing in the workplace is not just about providing a gym membership, says Dragić. 

She is working on a blueprint for employers who are willing to implement family-friendly workplace policies. 

“We need flexibility. We need to be able to be there for our kids while still being able to access work,” she says. 

“And so that doesn't mean that we're not going to work hard – or twice as hard as somebody else,” she says.

Dragić will sell the blueprint to the employers creating a funding stream for Mums Hub, which is a non-profit, she says. 

She wants to match women with real employment opportunities, she says. 

So far, two companies, a home care company called Platinum Homecare and Lady Cab, a women-focused taxi company, have agreed to offer hours to suit mums with kids in school or pre-school. 

To do the taxi driving, mums need to register as self-employed, she says, so she is working on resources for that.

A louder voice

Jennifer O’Donnell, a director of Mum’s Hub, used to work in geo-science consultancy, she said by phone on Thursday. 

She had to leave work because she couldn’t find suitable childcare for her two young children, she says. Not everyone can afford to do that, says O’Donnell. 

Childcare costs are high where she lives in South Dublin, and some creches don’t accept the state subsidy schemes, she says. “It's a constant battle from the day they are born.”

O’Donnell says Mum’s Hub is also developing a platform for advocacy, to push for solutions. “It's about time someone started shouting and roaring about this.”