What Happened:
In an interview with HR for Breakfast, fractional HR leader Amanda Halle expanded on a LinkedIn post that struck a nerve with working moms. After her twins arrived she deliberately slowed down: posts went from daily to weekly, business development took a back seat, and her work became, in her words, "incredibly focused."
Her core reframe is that balance is an illusion. Life comes in seasons, and she names this one heavy on motherhood and lighter on work, then matches her focus to it.
Her practical move for anyone running a service business alongside a young family: get ruthless about priorities. Name the single most important thing of the day and the week, spend your scarce focused hours on the work only you can do, and tell clients which days you are off while staying reachable for the sensitive calls HR cannot drop.
More Insight:
"Balance is a bit of an illusion. You don't really ever have balance," she said. The data backs her up: working mothers still shoulder the larger share of childcare and the mental load of running a household, even as their careers demand more.
What replaces balance is triage. Halle says she has gotten sharper about naming the most important task of the day and the week, then guarding her limited focus for it. "I use my time for the work that needs me the most," she said.
For a fractional leader, the challenge is doing all of this while meeting the needs of clients. Halle blocks off no-work days and states them plainly to the people she works with. She also stays reachable in the small windows, a naptime check-in or a quick reply, because HR work often involves sensitive matters that cannot sit for days.
Halle points to a leadership course where the facilitator opened with one question, "who are you?", and watched a room of executives answer with their job titles. Loosening that reflex is ongoing work for someone whose career has long been her identity.
She protects a short list of non-negotiables that keep her steady: daily exercise, which research consistently links to lower depression and anxiety; time outside with the kids; an HR peer community that offsets the isolation of working from home, a real risk when a quarter of fully remote workers report regular loneliness.