Today is our day to reflect on the ways in which our relationships with our mothers shaped us into the people we are today. Mothers deserve recognition and celebration every day of the year, but it’s good to have a day dedicated to honouring our mothers. And Mother’s Day is our day to recognize and celebrate all kinds of mothers: biological mothers, chosen mothers, adoptive mothers, trans mothers, working mothers, mothers-to-be, single mothers, surrogate mothers, and every other form or expression of a motherhood relationship. Mothers of all kinds, we see you and celebrate you today.
Within the global hospitality industry, women make up nearly 70 per cent of the work force. It is unsurprising, then, that women make up more than 80 per cent of HighStreet’s employees. And many women of HighStreet are mothers. With motherhood come certain values that definitely show up in our company culture.
Many years ago, we figured out HighStreet’s REACH values – reliable, engaged, accountable, caring, and hospitable – by describing and naming the personal values that we had in common. (After all, a company can’t really have values; it’s the people working for a company who have values.) Our values unite us and provide a common framework for building relationships with each other. And the one where our mothers shine the brightest is in our C value – caring. There is no on/off switch on this one. We care all the time about everything we do. Sound familiar? HighStreet makes room for mothers.
One final note: Mother’s Day can be a superficial card-and-flowers kind of holiday. Its public celebration is highly idealized and often omits all of the layers of emotional nuance that surround our relationships and our ideas of motherhood. Grief, absence, loss, and other difficult feelings will signify today; for many of us, for so many different reasons, Mother’s Day is a hard day. We see you, too.
