I am a nanny who, aside from taking pictures, is never on my phone when my charges are awake. I wear an Apple Watch for emergencies and calls from my employers. It’s really not hard! My charges get plenty of time in independent play but I am there to engage them when they need it.

That said, I will add that in my experience outside the house (in pre-covid days), Mother’s are far, far worse offenders than other nannies regarding phone usage.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here, it is, at a minimum, once an hour and it's not just for a second to check for texts/calls. It's a lot of scrolling and responding to longer texts which is what concerns me, I guess. Pretty much every time I go out into the living room/kitchen I see her on the phone, but I can't say I have a good estimate on how many times an hour. Suffice to say it's enough to make me uncomfortable that my son isn't being interacted with sufficiently. It sounds like this might just be the norm, though? Honestly I'd rather pay more for someone who can commit to looking at their phone less.

This is the part where I lose faith in you. Sufficiently for what? I mean sure, not as much as you want or feel you’re paying for. But it does sound like your standards are a little nutty. That said, it’s your money and your standards so just tell her your expectations and fire her if she doesn’t meet them. I’m sure you manage employees in your professional life. So manage this one.

Yes, it's unhealthy for an adult to be constantly doing a song and dance for your child. He needs time to think, to play solo, even to be bored--it sparks creativity. I'm always appalled by the children who come over for a playdate and then expect me to have arranged activities for them the entire time. Sorry, kiddos, benign neglect is the watchword at our house.

Anonymous wrote:On a side note, if your backyard is so dangerous that a child needs to be watched every second, then you should do something about that. Childproof your backyard the same way you childproof your house. You should be able to leave a child alone in the room, and you should be able to let a child roam around and explore their backyard without immediate hazards to their health and safety.

As long as an adult is outside with a toddler, I agree. I don’t think any toddler should be left alone outside, no matter how the backyard is set up.

On a side note, if your backyard is so dangerous that a child needs to be watched every second, then you should do something about that. Childproof your backyard the same way you childproof your house. You should be able to leave a child alone in the room, and you should be able to let a child roam around and explore their backyard without immediate hazards to their health and safety.

Anonymous wrote:OP here, it is, at a minimum, once an hour and it's not just for a second to check for texts/calls. It's a lot of scrolling and responding to longer texts which is what concerns me, I guess. Pretty much every time I go out into the living room/kitchen I see her on the phone, but I can't say I have a good estimate on how many times an hour. Suffice to say it's enough to make me uncomfortable that my son isn't being interacted with sufficiently. It sounds like this might just be the norm, though? Honestly I'd rather pay more for someone who can commit to looking at their phone less.

This is the part where I lose faith in you. Sufficiently for what? I mean sure, not as much as you want or feel you’re paying for. But it does sound like your standards are a little nutty. That said, it’s your money and your standards so just tell her your expectations and fire her if she doesn’t meet them. I’m sure you manage employees in your professional life. So manage this one.

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for all of those who posted helpful and non-hostile suggestions. I think perhaps I've also been frustrated by some other minor issues that I mentioned (lack of cleaning up after herself and DS, who is still pretty young at 20 months, and the fact that she is routinely 10-15 minutes late every morning despite the fact that I let her come later every morning since I don't have to drive to work anymore) and perhaps I just focused on the phone thing rather than looking at the bigger picture. Perhaps the suggestion about a quick mention of the phone usage at the end of the day will do the trick, since cutting it in half would be more than sufficient at this point. As people pointed out, she takes good care of my son and he loves her and that's really what matters most to me anyway. Thanks all.

If there are that many issues, you need a reset conversation, preferably during naptime.

“Larla, we love how you do xyz with our child. He’s so excited to see you every morning, and that really makes us feel wonderful about having you care for and teach him. We do have a few concerns about a few things. We’d like our home to be in the same condition at the end of the day that it was in the morning. We’d also like you to work on being here by abc time every morning. Finally, we’d prefer that you only accept urgent calls and respond to urgent texts throughout the day, and we’d like to suggest an Apple Watch (or similar device) as a way for you to feel connected while still paying attention to our son. If you can cut down on phone usage over the next month, especially while outside with him, we’d be happy to pay for half/all of that device. We know our son loves you, and we really want this to work long term. Having you here means that we can focus, knowing that we trust you to handle the things that come up throughout the day.”

You might as well accept phone usage. Women in my office are on their phones all day talking to their kids, husband's,, nannies, etc. I would like to fire all if them.

Thanks for all of those who posted helpful and non-hostile suggestions. I think perhaps I've also been frustrated by some other minor issues that I mentioned (lack of cleaning up after herself and DS, who is still pretty young at 20 months, and the fact that she is routinely 10-15 minutes late every morning despite the fact that I let her come later every morning since I don't have to drive to work anymore) and perhaps I just focused on the phone thing rather than looking at the bigger picture. Perhaps the suggestion about a quick mention of the phone usage at the end of the day will do the trick, since cutting it in half would be more than sufficient at this point. As people pointed out, she takes good care of my son and he loves her and that's really what matters most to me anyway. Thanks all.

Anonymous wrote:I think there is a vast middle ground between the Serious Conversation and just keeping silent. I assume either at the beginning or the end of the day, you have some kind of de-brief (how the day went, etc?) After an especially phone heavy day, I would throw in a “I’ve noticed you’re on your phone sometimes when you’re watching Sam. If you could cut back on that, I’d appreciate it.” And she’ll say, oh, sure! And you say thanks. The end.

It won’t move to nothing, but I bet it gets cut in half and that’s probably fine.

This is a good first step.

I have an iPhone and Apple watch.

I use my watch for incoming calls and texts that can’t wait. I use my phone during naptime, quiet time or after work for all outgoing calls and texts (except to my employers) and to respond to non-urgent texts and calls from earlier.

I use pandora a lot. Although it’s open on my phone, I change songs using my watch, which lets us walk away and not look at the phone.

I take a ton of pictures and videos of my charges (with my phone). They’re all uploaded immediately to a secure folder; only my employer and I have access.

I’m responsible for various emails related to school, activities, doctor/dentist, kids’ peers, etc. I view email subjects on my watch as they come in; most can wait for end of shift or naptime/quiet time, some require me to grab my phone and read/respond immediately. My employers prefer immediate responses to the emails...

I also use my phone to look up answers to kids’ questions: What’s the biggest bird? What do dragons eat? (We researched Komodo dragons versus having a discussion about fantasy vs reality, and the child was fine even when the Komodo dragon looked nothing like dragon on his shirt.) How can ants fly?

There’s a happy medium between no phone use and continual use. Your nanny needs to learn when and how it’s appropriate.