Employees with their parents at ‘Bring in Your Parents Day’ at LinkedIn
Employees with their parents at ‘Bring in Your Parents Day’ at LinkedIn. Image: Luke Maxwell

Would you bring your parents to work? LinkedIn employees did

23 Nov 2017

Would you bring your parents to your office to show them around if you had the chance?

Do you think your parents could confidently explain what your job is? How much do they know about the ins and outs of your work?

As technology advances rapidly, a huge proportion of the tech workforce are working at large multinationals that didn’t even exist 20 years ago.

With this in mind, it’s no surprise that those employees’ parents might not be completely clear about what exactly they do at work or what their job entails.

After all, not only are the companies relatively new, but hundreds of jobs exist now that never existed before.

But it’s for this reason that LinkedIn does something a little different to your standard ‘Bring Your Children to Work Day’.

Now celebrating its fifth year, ‘Bring in Your Parents Day’ gives LinkedIn employees the opportunity to bring their parents to work, show them around the office, meet their managers and colleagues, and get a better idea of what their child’s job entails.

Jamie Barbour is a relationship manager at LinkedIn Dublin, and he brought his mother and father to see the office.

His mother, Sheila Barbour, said the event was really spectacular. “It’s such a wonderful building, such a happy place and it’s just wonderful to see where Jamie works,” she said.

A great opportunity

Mary Lee works at LinkedIn as a customer success manager. She brought her parents to give them a better understanding of her job.

“Quite honestly, my parents had probably no idea where I worked or what I did so, I felt it was a really good opportunity to explain to them what I did and see it in real life.”

Throughout the day, LinkedIn employees offered tours of the new Dublin office. On the fifth floor, there was tea and coffee as well as a cupcake decorating station and a photography area.

The event also included presentations for the parents to give them a strong understanding of LinkedIn.

This year’s event was Tori Wright’s third ‘Bring in Your Parents Day’, who came all the way from Florida.

However, it was her first time in the new Dublin office. She was there with her daughter, global account manager Anna Wright.

“The presentation that was done today helped me really understand it a little better,” said Tori.

Mona Elsamahy is a talent acquisition partner at the company. She got the opportunity to show her mother Rawia Fahmy around, who flew all the way from Egypt.

Rawia said she initially worried when her daughter came to Ireland because she was on her own. “But, when I came and visited her, I was very happy because everything was organised and it’s very lovely.”

Jenny Darmody
By Jenny Darmody

Jenny Darmody became the editor of Silicon Republic in 2023, having worked as the deputy editor since February 2020. When she’s not writing about the science and tech industry, she’s writing short stories and attempting novels. She continuously buys more books than she can read in a lifetime and pretty stationery is her kryptonite. She also believes seagulls to be the root of all evil and her baking is the stuff of legends.

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