What is a hybrid?

The Cambridge Dictionary defines “hybrid” as, “having or produced by a combination of two or more distinct elements”…

We live in an age of hybrids.  Many of us all have myriad skills and are not easily defined by one job, activity, skill, proclivity, interest, or pursuit.  Hometown Nannies+ began in the land of hybrids: Los Angeles, a city formerly brimming with orange groves but now overflowing with writer-directors, actor-producers, singer-songwriters, actor-activists, actor-restaurateurs, actor-vintners, writer-producers, writer-surfers, actor-entrepreneurs, actor-influencers, gaffer-stunt doubles, and so forth.
We know a thing to two about hybrids, which is why we speculated that some of our candidates actually might prefer to wear more than one hat.

Also, over 3+ decades, we’ve heard hundreds of stories (I heard one today) of employees who are hired for one role and are asked, often without much choice, to segue into others. Someone hired as a nanny becomes a nanny and a housekeeper and a cook and then must care for an aging grandparent, when she signed on as a nanny, often at the same salary. Her/his job becomes increasingly stressful and he/she finds herself short of time to do a good job, sometimes at the expense of good health.

So we decided to “work backward”* or actually, to anticipate a family’s needs and to work with “forward” vision, at the risk of self-contradiction and if you can see our rationale. Eureka: why not align a family’s needs with a candidate’s skill set, experience, and interests?

This does not mean placing one candidate to do two full-time jobs. But we’ve had many nannies who love to cook and PAs who like to do p/t childcare and great housekeepers who love babies, have infant experience, drivers who are also wonderful valets, and many applicants who are superlative household managers and would be more than happy to mix up the job.  So – why not help people go into a job with eyes open? And, when you do hire a “hybrid” his/her job duties are delineated in a family-nanny/domestic agreement so that everyone has clear expectations going in.

Hope this clarifies our newest vision for in-home staffing. Contact us for more info. Thank you.
 
*In simple terms, the ‘working backward’ method can be described as starting with a customer want, need, or problem and providing a solution through a product, service, or experience. The alternative involves starting with a product, feature, or solution and trying to find an audience for it.