Dear Aunt Jobby,

I am applying for a job but the company is privately held. I am finding it very difficult to find any info about the company. I don’t know anyone there either. How can I find out whether it is a good place for a working mom? I’d like to know if they were open to me working flexible hours, especially leaving early a few days a week to get my kids off the school bus.

Melinda, San Antonio, TX

Melinda, at the risk of being mean, Let me Google that for you, is a great place to start. But I am sure you have done this already. You may also want to read Working Mother’s list of the best companies for working moms.

Jobitorial and Glassdoor are Web sites where employees review their companies, also makes for good reading.

photo credit: GiantGlassOfMilk

To get a better response than you’ll get from cranky old me, I asked someone who really does know, expert Kellie Stone. I love her suggestion about how to talk to moms already working for the company.

Dear Melinda,

You should probably focus on two main areas:

Basic Company Knowledge – Keep in mind, if the company is not willing to openly reveal important information, they may be replacing someone and not want any current employees to know what they are doing.

In this case, you might have to apply blindly and hope that you get the information during an interview. There may be other reasons (negative ones) for them to hide company information from the public, so be savvy with your decision to pursue them.

“How can I tell if company is family friendly?”

If you can get a hold of a phone number or an email address, you can actually contact the company’s public relations department and request copies of the last three years annual reports, product literature, financial performance statements, merger commentary, newspaper or magazine articles, and company newsletters. And, face it, with the world at your fingertips via the Internet, you can find anything if you look hard enough. This is some down and dirty investigating that will give the edge you need to win over any interviewing VP or manager.

A Little More Personal – One thing that I always found helpful was interviewing the company’s present employees. It is your right to know, ahead of time, what the working environment is like (whether it is mommy friendly) before you accept a position. Just ask the Human Resources manager to set up several short meetings with any random employees; in your case, mothers who have been with the company for a while would be advantageous. This will give you the 411 on any negative issues and hopefully a clue about the company’s work culture.

Good luck with your job search, Melinda. You can find more information on job search topics at The Best Interview Strategies. There are four articles in the series; make sure to read them all.

Kellie Stone is a work at home mom of six children (two have left the nest). An Interior Designer by trade, she left the workforce to help other women through her life-changing blog, Women’s Life Link. Kellie has also completed her first novel, Unaware, and is working on a second.

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