Meet our founder, Laurel Wessman, a doctor and mom of three who chases down her entrepreneurial ideas in her spare time.
What inspired you to create the Idly app?
When I found out my third child was on the way, I became desperate to find a productivity tool that could help me balance my work and my personal life. I got by with paper calendars and organized binders, and even tried a wall monitor to keep it all on track. But nothing could quite help me balance my practice with say, penciling in time to pump at work. An employer-provided space or 100% shared app just didn’t honor my privacy.
I admitted that no one can give from an empty cup, and if I feel this way, many parents probably do. That’s why I started Idly. Calendaring should be delightful. It should be, “You get to do this.” Not, “You have to do this.” The whole point of the Idly calendar is to simplify the work life balance of our users and help the entire family system feel more at ease.
I really enjoy the playfulness and tension between ultra productivity and what it means to be idle. There’s a sweet spot that Idly captures and brings to people.
Why is privacy so important?
Everyone organizes their calendar their own way in their own private space. I wanted to give everyone that private space, but make them connected. I found that my husband and nanny didn’t want to get involved in the calendar because they organized things their own way and didn’t want to mess with my system. I wanted to give everyone a private space to plan their own way, protect their own time, and contribute to the family’s shared organization.
As a physician, my work meetings are all confidential. But you don’t need to be a doctor or a lawyer to deserve privacy. A date night, financial planning meeting or just highly coveted free-time should be protected, too.
How do you balance your life?
My profession brings me a lot of intrinsic joy. In my practice, I help people and use my abilities to serve others. With Idly, I tap into a different part of my brain that’s more artistic and creative. Because I get so much joy from doing these things, it doesn’t feel so much like work.
When I finally get time to myself—and there aren’t any little kid fingers wiggling under my door—I decompress with slow flow yoga. A lot of the time I’m “go go go,” so it always feels good to slow down.
How do times need to change to support modern families?
The modern era isn’t really equipped to handle women as breadwinners or the needs of non-traditional families. There’s no longer this idea of a whole village to support a growing family. Instead, we expect moms to quietly take on this massive amount of organization and planning, without credit for all that effort. Beyond that, all kinds of families are underrepresented and left out of the conversation: divorced parents, LGBTQ+ parents, parents who take care of their own parents. We all deserve to have our needs catered to with the tools we use.
People look at social media and feel all this pressure to perform and be productive, when for plenty of people, it’s a huge accomplishment just to get out of bed in the morning. I’ve been there. We need to be open to asking for help, and recognizing we’re not alone in our problems.
Family life is messy and imperfect, but that’s part of its beauty. If more companies and support systems celebrate this reality, it will make all of our lives easier.
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Stay tuned for more thinking and updates from Laurel as Idly continues to expand its mission.
