The Mom Tax

The Hidden Cost of Doing It All; Ashley Chang on Why You Deserve Support

This just in, it actually does take a village.

This week we meet up with Ashley Chang, CEO and founder of Sundays, an executive assistant staffing company that provides world-class assistants for work and home. Built for parents who refuse to choose; the concept for Sundays was born out of Ashley watching her own mother, a software engineer in the 80s, leave the workforce because she felt she had to choose between her career and her family.

As Ashley navigated her own career path, she kept witnessing the women around her have to make the same choice as her mom. Even though she had a fulfilling career and was successful on paper, a fire began burning inside of her that she was meant for more. So, in her spare time after work, she spoke to 1000 working parents about their struggles and what kind of support would actually move the needle. Less than three years later she is solving the problem from both angles; deploying wickedly smart women that need a flexible work situation so they can take care of their families to help the women and parents who need dependable support in the home and the office.

We talk about the mom tax, how “doing it all” is a endless trap of exhaustion and guilt and really what we all need is a damn village. Ashley shares what it is like to be a working mom who does actually have the support she needs and how that support has enabled her to grow her company to 200+ clients and $2M in annual re-occuring revenue.

Ashley’s story and the story of the work that the Sundays team is doing is inspiring to say the least, but what stands out the most in our conversation is when Ashley tells us about coming back to work after maternity leave, re-prioritizing when life shifts, the power of leaning into an ever changing and ever evolving strategy, along with literal examples of how we can all be asking for more help.

What you’ll learn:

• The “mom tax” and why women carry the invisible load
• How to do a time and energy audit in 15 minutes
• What to delegate first and how to actually let go
• Why asking for help is a growth strategy, not a failure
• How Ashley scaled Sundays to 200 clients with an all-women team

While Ashley is so grateful for the time she got to spend with her mom growing up, and believes every woman gets to choose what is best for her when it comes to work and motherhood, she is here to ensure women have the choice.

About Ashley

Ashley Chang Dawson is the co-founder and CEO of Sundays. She was inspired to start Sundays by her own mother, a software engineer in the 80s who left the workforce because she felt she had to choose between her career and her family. Before founding Sundays, Ashley spent a decade immersed in early-stage technology companies — as the first employee at a developer tools company, building member experience for health insurance and benefits at Collective Health, and joining Carta to help scale their Venture Capital products from $10M to over $100M in revenue. Throughout that journey, she watched many of the most brilliant women she knows face that same impossible choice, three decades later. Over the past year, she has spoken with more than 1,000 parents about what makes it so hard to have both a meaningful career and a full family life — and she is deeply on a mission to change that for future generations.