The Sittercity-Tested, Mom-Approved Top Ten List of Working Parent Guides

Is it time to get out those business suits and report back to the boss?

When it's time to head back to work, we totally understand if you're hesitant. After all, you're bound to have tons of questions about how your home life will be affected by working and vice versa.

That's why Sittercity has compiled a list of ultra-helpful books for working parents. Whether you've just discovered that you're pregnant or you've been a working parents for years, these books will help address your questions and concerns as they relate to your life stage. Now all that's left to do is to find time to read them...

The Working Parents Handbook

By June Solnit Sale, Ellen Melinkoff, Kit Kollenberg

One of the most popular paperbacks for working parents, The Working Parents' Handbook provides realistic advice on every topic you've been wondering about. Perhaps the best feature of this book is that it's arranged chronologically, guiding you from pregnancy through the growth of your child. The authors bring up topics you wouldn't normally expect to find in a book for working moms, like grocery shopping, travel safety and potty training, making this the ultimate 2-in-1 book.

Going Back to Work: A Survival Guide for Comeback Moms

By Mary W. Quigley and Loretta E. Kaufman

Does your business suit still fit? Are you ready to wipe the dust off your briefcase? This is the book for working moms who took some time off and are looking at making the transition back into the workforce. This transition can be overwhelming and filled with so many questions. How do I find a new position? Do I deserve the same salary I was earning? What about working from home? The authors tackle these questions and many others. They also provide practical activities you can execute long before you want to return to work to make it easier when you decide it's time.

This Is How We Do It : The Working Mothers' Manifesto

By Carol Evans

This author did her research - literally. The CEO and President of Working Mother magazine, Carol Evans, spoke with five hundred working moms. Out of these interviews came inspiring reports of real moms who are "doing it all" and actually enjoying it. These moms reveal their best expert advice on finding the holy grail of balancing career and family. Evans also pulls many parenting solutions from advice she's received from the magazine's three million readers over its 25-year life span. Invaluable!

Survival Tips for Working Moms: 297 Real Tips from Real Moms

By Linda Goodman Pillsbury

You're a mom. You've got diapers to change, noses to wipe and minds to mold. Who can find the time to read? Well, if this sounds familiar, Survival Tips for Working Moms is the book for you to toss in your baby bag for those times when you have five minutes of quiet that you don't know what to do with. The book is full of tips for working moms that you'll wish you had thought of sooner! Although we are convinced that our moms figured out the peanut butter one first.

The Working Mother's Guide to Life: Strategies, Secrets, and Solutions

By Linda Mason

The author of this book is a mother who was integral in the development of Bright Horizons Family Solutions, the country's primary provider of on-site child care for businesses. With such expertise, her advice is worth a listen! (...Even though her book sounds like it might be a guide to spying rather than a guide for parents.) Mason lays out a program divided into three sections based on her personal experience both as a working mom and from working with working moms. Her strategies are effective and realistic, but moms low on the income scale without a partner to lend financial support may find her plan hard to follow.

Briefcase Moms: 10 Proven Practices to Balance Working Mothers' Lives

By Lisa Martin

Life coach to hundreds of mothers, Lisa Martin reveals 10 applications she has used in her coaching sessions that have helped career-driven moms find the balance they need. Briefcase Moms shows you how to utilize the practices of simplification, lightness, well-being, discovery, alignment, liberation, protection, connection, courage and reflection. This book is motivational, inspiring and one of the few books that focuses not only on work and kids, but on moms and their needs, too.

The Mom Economy : The Mothers' Guide to Getting Family-Friendly Work

By Elizabeth Berger and Elizabeth Wilcox

Following the arrival of a new baby, family matters will be first and foremost on your list of priorities. It's a challenge to return to a career and not just a job. The Mom Economy suggests ways to get back into your career, while still leaving family at the top of the list. This book is great for moms who need an extra burst of confidence before going to that first interview.

The Third Shift: Managing Hard Choices in Our Careers, Homes and Lives as Women

By Michele Bolton

In a fresh approach to the career/motherhood book, The Third Shift identifies the three shifts moms go through daily and acknowledges that there is no rest for the weary when it comes to being a mom. With work as the first shift, home life as a second shift and a third shift of guilt and anxiety, it's easy to become overwhelmed and difficult to juggle so many obligations. The book spotlights the mistake many mothers make of over-scheduling themselves and gives concrete advice on how to battle and conquer the myth that moms can do it all in a day.

Business Dad: How Good Businessmen Can Make Great Fathers (and Vice Versa)

By Julie Hirschfeld and Tom Hirschfeld

Don't forget the dads! In an age where dads are not only picking up a lot of the slack their fathers left behind, but in many cases, stepping in as the primary caregiver, it's a shame there isn't more helpful advice for working fathers. Business Dad, written by a former corporate VP, is geared towards the dad who's used to reading corporate bestsellers and using language that lawyers, engineers and even stockbrokers can understand. He sticks to the point, tackling issues like understanding kids, discipline and communication with Mom while relaying the very important message that the man who puts fatherhood first is the best kind of businessman.

Flex Time: A Working Mother's Guide to Balancing Career and Family

By Jacqueline Foley and Sally Armstrong

Balancing career and family life is all about trade-offs. Flex Time points out these trade-offs while acknowledging the positive and negative impacts they can have on your career. Foley stresses the importance of exchange between work and family rather than sacrifice on either end. She bases her advice on her own experience as well as the interviews she conducted with over 100 working moms. If you work well with lists (how much income you need, how often you can work, or what you need to make a business plan), this is the book for you.