On Tuesday 8 September, Josephine Visser, founder of Elementa Interior Design, joined the Return To Work Mums panel “Stronger Than Ever: The Power of Working Mums”. She shared the stage with Ashleigh from designfinch, Mansi from AAID and Redha from JLL. The session was moderated by Nichola Hijris, A&D Middle East & Africa at MillerKnoll.
We hear a lot about the challenges of being a working mum. The guilt. The juggling. The career gap. All of that is real. But this panel did something different. We flipped the conversation. The question was simple: what do we underestimate about the value mothers bring into the workplace?
It was an honest and uplifting conversation. Here is what came out of it.
Motherhood as a leadership accelerator
When you become a mum, you don’t get a training period. You learn on the job, every day, with very little sleep. You make decisions fast. You stay calm when things go wrong. You read people before they say a word.
“Running a design studio and raising children ask for the same things,” says Josephine. “You need to be decisive, you need patience, and you need to stay calm when the plan changes. Motherhood gave me more of all three.”
These are exactly the qualities you need to lead a team. In interior design, every project has many moving parts. Clients, contractors, suppliers, approvals, deadlines. A leader who stays steady keeps the whole project steady.
Prioritise ruthlessly
This was Josephine’s main point on the day: since becoming a mum, it’s easier to prioritise things.
“Before children, everything felt urgent,” says Josephine. “Now I know very quickly what is urgent, what is important and what simply doesn’t matter. My time is limited, so I spend it where it makes the biggest difference for my clients, my team and my family.”
In a design studio, that matters. A villa project can have hundreds of decisions in a single week. Not every decision needs the same amount of time. Knowing where to focus is what keeps a project on time and on budget.
Empathy without losing authority
Many of the panellists spoke about this. Motherhood teaches you to understand people better. You read situations more intuitively. You notice when someone on your team is struggling before they tell you.
That empathy does not make you a softer leader. It makes you a better one.
“You can be kind and still be clear,” says Josephine. “My team knows I care about them. They also know what I expect. Those two things go together.”
Resilience under pressure
With children, things rarely go to plan. A sick child on the morning of a big presentation. A school call in the middle of a site visit. You learn to find a solution and move on.
The same is true on a project. A material arrives in the wrong colour. A contractor is delayed. An approval takes longer than expected. Mothers are used to this. We are comfortable with uncertainty, because we live with it every day.
A stronger sense of perspective
Motherhood puts things in perspective. You learn what is worth worrying about and what really isn’t.
“A delay on site is not the end of the world,” says Josephine. “It needs solving, and we solve it. But I don’t carry every small problem home with me anymore. That makes me calmer, and a calm leader makes better decisions.”
The confidence to say no
This one came up again and again. Becoming a mum gives you the confidence to set boundaries. You protect your time. You become more intentional about where your energy goes.
For a business owner, that is a real strength. Saying no to the wrong project ßmakes room for the right one.
Multitasking vs. true prioritisation
Mums are often praised for multitasking. But the panel agreed that the real skill is not doing ten things at once. It is choosing the right three things and doing them well.
You make decisions quickly. You don’t need everything to be perfect before you move forward. In design, perfection matters in the final result. But in the process, momentum matters too.
Motherhood and creativity
Nichola asked whether becoming a mother has changed the way we approach design. For Josephine, the answer is yes.
“When I design a family home now, I think differently,” says Josephine. “Where do the children drop their school bags? Where does the stroller go? Is the stone on the kitchen island practical with small hands around? I don’t just design how a home looks. I design how a family actually lives in it.”
This is where lived experience becomes a design tool. Many of our clients at Elementa are families. They live in villas with children, grandparents and staff. Understanding everyday life helps us create homes that are beautiful and work in real life.
The value of lived experience
Mothers bring a deeper understanding of people, families and wellbeing into their work. In residential interior design, that is not a soft skill. It is the core of the job.
A home needs to support routines. Morning rush. Homework at the kitchen table. Quiet time in the evening. When a designer has lived those routines, the questions in the briefing become sharper. The layouts become smarter. The storage ends up in the right place.
Redefining the career narrative
The biggest message of the day: motherhood is not a career interruption. It can make a career stronger.
“Being a mum didn’t slow me down,” says Josephine. “It made me sharper about what I wanted to build with Elementa, and why.”
Too often, women feel they have to choose. Step back from their career, or step back from their family. The women on that panel, and in that room, showed that there is another way. It is not always easy. But the strengths you gain as a mother are real, and they belong in the workplace.
Thank you
A big thank you to Return To Work Mums for organising this panel, to Nichola for guiding the conversation so naturally, and to Ashleigh, Mansi and Redha for sharing their stories so openly. And thank you to every woman in the room. The energy was incredible.
At Elementa Interior Design, we believe great design comes from understanding people. “Motherhood has taught me more about people than anything else,” says Josephine.
Are you planning a new home for your family in Dubai? Contact us to book an interior design consultation.
