The Many Skills of A Stay-At-Home Mom

For a long time, being a stay-at-home was the norm for women. Over the years, that’s changed, and more women are choosing to have careers alongside families. And that’s great! But it’s placed a sort of stigma that the women who maintain their careers have skills that stay-at-home moms don’t.

And that’s the stigma that I want to discuss today. Because the truth is, stay-at-home moms have skills too and plenty of them. So here are some of the many skills that stay-at-home moms possess…

Communication And Negotiation

In many workplace environments, communication is a vital skill that can take an employee to the next level. In the rest of the world; communication can be the key to completing a lot of day-to-day tasks, forming relationships, and more. So there’s no doubt that this is a valued skill to have.

And stay-at-home moms definitely have it! After all, not only do you communicate daily with your kids in order to take care of them, but you also have to communicate with others in a lot of different scenarios purely because you are a mom. Your kid’s teachers, your kid’s doctors, your kid’s friend’s parents, etc. Over time, this will lead to top notch communication skills that many would envy.

And as far as negotiating goes, any stay-at-home mom would agree that it’s a daily part of raising small kids. Whether it’s convincing them to brush their teeth in order to get an extra bedtime story, or reminding them that they’ll feel less sick if they take the “gross” medicine that you’re offering.

These negotiating skills that a stay-at-home mom develops are useful in a lot of different situations, both inside and outside of the home.

Financial Planning

There’s nothing that will teach you the art of budgeting and managing your finances quite like being a mom. Taking care of personal finance when it’s just you, or even you and your significant other, is an easy task compared to balancing the books of an entire family’s finances.

You suddenly have to think about extra mouths to feed, potential doctor’s appointments, money for schooling; not to mention all the miscellaneous things that kids need, such as toys or fun experiences. Raising a kid, or multiple children, can cost a pretty penny. And as a stay-at-home mom, you’ll often have to pull a lot of weight in the financial planning department.

Crisis Management And Problem Solving Skills

Not everyone can say that they stay calm and unbothered in a crisis, and it’s a tough skill to learn. But for most stay-at-home moms, putting out metaphorical fires is just a day in the life. You get used to unexpected events and having to think on your feet rather quickly.

Like I said, this skill is a hard one to learn. And that makes it even more valuable to have. So don’t underestimate how helpful an unflappable person could be in a stressful situation.

As for the problem solving skills, they’re a natural part of learning crisis management. You have to be able to not only stay calm in a crisis, but also learn how to fix the problem at hand. And when it comes to parenting, sometimes you have to come up with very original solutions.

So stay-at-home moms are often masters at problem solving, which might be why they are known to give such great advice.

Event Planning And Project Management

Finding a reliable party planner is hard for a reason, it’s hard to pull off an event whether it be small or large. And honing this skill takes time and practice, which are two things that many stay-at-home moms have plenty of. Helping out with a school event, putting together a birthday party for your little one, moms have to plan a lot of parties.

This often gives them the ability to create an event that even a professional party planner would be impressed by. And a mom’s financial planning skills that we discussed earlier can also help her pull off a great party on a budget. Talk about a win-win!

But party planning isn’t the only type of project that a stay-at-home mom might take on. Maybe it’s planning a vacation, a special game night, etc. In any case, moms are great at making sure things go off without a hitch by making sure every little detail is through and taken care of.

Time Management

No matter who you are, or what you do, time management skills are something that anyone could benefit from improving. And a lot of stay-at-home moms have to figure it out the hard way, because when you’re raising kids… there’s simply not enough time in the day. So you have to find a way to make the hours count.

For instance, even your morning routine has to be finely tuned when you’re a stay-at-home mom. You have to get everyone out of bed, breakfast made, kids to school or kids starting school (if you’re homeschooling), etc. And the more kids you have, the harder that gets to pull off. Trust me, I speak from experience.

After years and years of that, it’s safe to say that stay-at-home moms can add crazy good time management skills to their list.

And really, there are too many of these skills to add them all to this list.

Final Thoughts

So I’ll leave you here. I just want to mention that I really do respect moms who work outside the home and raise their family, but I also think that women who stay at home deserve to be respected too. At the end of the day all moms work hard and I congratulate you all on a job well done!

If you would like to add more skills to the list, please leave them in the comments below.