Balancing Act: Deborah Lovich (A)

Deborah Lovich, Partner at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), has been given the opportunity of a lifetime: to join the firm's Executive Committee as its youngest member and only current woman, as well as just the second woman in its history. Encouraged by her mentors, she saw this role as an important platform to help shape BCG's future. Yet, she had family to consider. Taking up the opportunity would add an additional five to six weeks of travel per year, on top of an already hectic schedule that kept her from home and her four children most days of the week. Her husband Mark, who had finished a grueling 12-year MD-PhD program one year earlier, decided to put his career on hold to be a stay-at-home dad because of her many commitments. Now, with the possibility of even further time away from the family looming, and the kids wanting more time with her, Mark made a serious demand: that she not only decline the Executive Committee role, but also scale back her commitments so that he could relaunch his career. Lovich must weigh how to balance her responsibilities to her family without sacrificing the career she had worked so hard to build.