Family Inc.
Caitlin and Andrew Friedman
Tarcher/Penguin, $16.95, 320 pages
In "Family Inc.," Caitlin and Andrew Friedman, professionals who have been married for more than 10 years and are the parents of two children, argue that taking the office home with you benefits your family life.
Applying various office- management strategies to the home, such as holding weekly agenda meetings for both short- and long-term goals, delegating responsibility and creating plans for dealing with unexpected hardships, will create a more harmonious family life – not only without sacrificing the tender and loving domestic relationships, but also enhancing them, primarily by reducing the amount of stress inherent in a chaotic household.
While the Friedmans offer several useful tips on organizing multiple schedules and streamlining household tasks, and their love of making lists speaks to my own, it is worth pointing out that their audience appears to be similar to themselves and the other couples providing anecdotal evidence to support each chapter: a dual-income family with an enviable level of financial stability, regardless of economic obstacles faced in the past.
It's not that their advice is therefore suspect, but including a broader swath of working families, particularly those that may not have the ready income or resources available to contract regular in-home child care or housecleaning, might have lent more substance to their arguments.
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