Mansi Kothari
Hi there, I’m Mansi! I’m interested in creating a better world through technology. I have worked at growth-stage startups for several years, most recently as a product leader at Maven Clinic, a digital health company supporting women and families. As of last week, I’m on a sabbatical, focused on pursuing a few of my own creative projects and deciding my next career move. I live in New York with my partner Sushil and our 10-month-old, Niam. I enjoy writing and recently published a tiny love story in the NYT about my experience as a new mother.
What does your normal working day look like?
Niam is our analog alarm clock, and he’s most energized in the morning after his long night of beauty sleep. We FaceTime with family, play and read a few books together with Niam, eat breakfast, and start the day, trading places with our nanny at 8 am. During the work day, Niam is with our nanny, but I also take breaks to breastfeed him.
In the evenings, we cool down from work, try to exercise or go for a walk, and may invite parents or friends to visit. Before putting Niam to sleep, we play silly games to make him laugh (lately, he’s loving hide and seek). Then we eat dinner and unwind by reading, watching TV, or working on personal projects.
How long have you had this routine?
Since I went back to work after parental leave in February, with some tweaks along the way.
How has it changed as your children have gotten older or as your family has grown?
Recently, my husband and I have been trying to incorporate exercise into our routine regularly. I’m sure our routine will continue to evolve as Niam grows up!
What boundaries have you set around your work, and how did you work with your colleagues to enable them?
I’m still breastfeeding our son and prefer feeding directly rather than pumping. I have feeding blocks on my work calendar. Usually, I don’t have meetings during those times, but when I do, I turn my camera off for those meetings while I feed, and my colleagues know to expect that.
Since coming back from parental leave, I typically don’t take meetings after 6 pm, try not to work at night, and avoid working on weekends. My colleagues respect those boundaries; it’s mostly a practice in self-discipline for me to be okay leaving work unfinished. There will always be tomorrow!
What are the most important things for you to get right to have a successful day?
Since having a baby, we’ve adopted more routine in our lives to reduce the mental load of planning. For example, we typically buy groceries on Sunday and run laundry on Mondays and Fridays. We also adjusted Niam to a regular (but adaptable) schedule, with routine timings for his feeds, bathtime, and daily walk.
Switching to weekends, what are the most important things to get right to have an excellent weekend day?
On the weekends, we try to keep our mornings free so Niam has time for his nap and is ready to go once he wakes up. We used to pack our weekends with lots of plans, but now we enjoy limiting our plans to one a day when possible. We go for long walks together as a family. We enjoy hosting people in our space, which gives us more flexibility to watch Niam and time for them to get to know him. We often stay with our parents for the weekend, providing us with the freedom to go out and keep Niam home.
Do you have anything that works particularly well in your childcare situation?
Flexibility in where we can work has been so helpful for us! If one of us has plans, the other can watch Niam and finish up work from home. If we’re going out together, we ask our nanny to stay later. We’re also incredibly lucky that both of our parents live in the area and would welcome the opportunity for some alone time with Niam.
What has been the most impactful thing you've done to save time / energy in your family?
Keeping everyone fed is a huge time suck, so we’re more regimented about how we procure and prepare our meals! I have a spreadsheet of our fresh foods and pantry items that we typically stock in our kitchen. Every week, I check what’s missing before restocking. If we have time, we’ll go to the grocery and shop at our leisure. If we’re stretched for time, we use delivery apps and pay up for convenience. Our favorite one is Gorillas, which delivers everyday food items (including fresh products) within 15 minutes. I also log our go-to meal ideas in the spreadsheet, to remove some of the planning involved in deciding what to make.
What principles have served you best in your parenting?
1 - Reducing clutter can reduce the stress of parenting. We try to be mindful about our purchases and find joy in everyday objects.
2 - Kids can adapt to the life you want to lead. This principle is well articulated in a sleep training book we love, Twelve Hours’ Sleep by Twelve Weeks. We’ve found that if we condition Niam to travel, go to restaurants, and socialize with different people, he will adapt accordingly.
3 - Kids can develop relationships with people of all ages. We encourage individual friends and family members to develop their own relationships with Niam.
4 - Kids should be comfortable spending time with themselves. We believe in trying to cultivate independence at a young age by leaving Niam in his own space for some time during the day. This frees up our time as well.
5 - Kids will feed off the energy you surround them with. We try to stay goofy, positive, and loving as much as we can.
Is there a primary parent in your household, or do you split the parenting evenly?
In theory, we split parenting evenly. In practice, I take on more of the mental load and time involved in managing many of the additional household logistics that have become part of our lives since starting the family.
Sush and I try to divide and conquer on simple execution tasks, but I spend a significant amount of energy on things that require thinking ahead - like ordering the next size up on Niam’s clothes, managing his transition from purees to soft foods, and researching experiential classes for him.
We’ve reflected a lot on how we ended up with this distribution and what we can do differently. It’s complicated! Some things boil down to personality. I’ve always been more of the planner in our relationship, so I’ve taken on more now. I love food and care more about what we eat, so I’ve naturally taken the lead on managing all food-related things, which is one of the most time-intensive sets of tasks. I also had longer parental leave, work remotely, and breastfeed Niam, which means I’m more intimately immersed in his day-to-day life. However, we’re working to create a better model, where we each have bandwidth to be the parents and people we want to be.
We’ve tried a few different strategies to help us make sure that the split between us is fair. For example, we instituted a weekly planning session, discussing all of our household tasks and plans for the week and distributing responsibilities between us. We’ve also tried a model where we delegate to each other tasks that we want to get off our plates. We’re still working on figuring out the perfect system that consistently works for us.
How do you bring play and fun into your time with your children?
We love to bring joy to Niam’s life through song and dance. You can find us spitting out new lyrics, tunes, and beats to make him smile, or waltzing across the apartment with him belting out “Oh My Darling Clementine.”
What is your top trick for making family time easy?
We spend a lot of time at each of our parents’ houses with Niam, so we keep an extra set of the essentials (bathtub, towels, wipes, etc.) at each home so that we can travel lighter and settle in easily.
What is something unusual or unique that you do in your family?
We have a unique method for goal setting that I’ve written about more extensively in this Medium article. Since 2017, we’ve set annual goals (both shared and individual) for ourselves in 7 categories: Family, Friends, Career, well-being, Skills & Hobbies, Social & Environmental Impact, and Finance. Each month we discuss progress on our goals to hold ourselves accountable. This year, some of our Family goals, for example, included: (a) Develop and articulate our principles for parenting, (b) Set up a new home for our nuclear family, and (c) Take Niam on a global tour to visit family. It’s really special to be able to reflect back on our goals through the years and how we’ve evolved as people over time.
What piece of advice do you give to all new parents? What advice should they ignore?
One of the unexpected joys of parenting has been the enthusiasm and love that our friends and family have for Niam (especially since he is the first grandchild!). We’ve come to appreciate the village that it takes to raise a child and are excited for the special role that different relatives can play in Niam’s life. One of our favorite digital apps for parenting is BackThen, a family photo sharing app that we use to upload photos of Niam for his fans. It’s a great way for them to stay in the loop about his evolution and development. Niam’s great-grandmothers in India check the app everyday!