What 40 hour work week? The time and space of the 40 hour work week has exploded according to John Challenger, president and CEO of Challneger, Gray & Christmas outplacement firm in Chicago. "We not only do our work at the office, but we do it at home, on the road or on vacation." And that's not all bad.

Thanks to techonology, the dedicated professional is working more efficiently than ever before. It is the flexibility of being mobile that allows a parent to take a family member to the doctor or to attend a child's event during the weekday. Touching base from vacation at the very least points to the fact that the individual is on vacation and not allowing earned time off to go unused.

Take family leave for example. There is no national policy on the time a new parent can take when they have a new child. Scores of new parents manage to cobble together a plan with their employer and FMLA. Each plan is unique and negotiated. And whether it involves changing jobs, moving, taking unpaid time off or returning to work, parenting marches on. In fact, it is parenting that is so compelling that a new parent will go to bat to get some time off even risking or changing jobs to do what feels right for their family. Not so with most other circumstances such as caring for an elderly parent. I used to work for a guy who put his dad in a nursing center in the midWest, far from the East Coast city Dad lived his entire life in. My boss had a rationale: "I am more likely to visit my dad if he is in a city that I crisscross when travelling for work." I remember him saying he saw his dad about three times that year.

I can't help wondering what would happen if we all began to negotiate for balance in our working hours with the same passion that surfaces at the birth of our children. With CFO Magazine citing that personnel, salaries and skilled labor are the things on most CFO's minds, what if talent retention simply hinged on some flexibility during the transition times of our lives?