Introduction

Hello, and thank you for reading!
I'm Nakamoto, a frontend developer at KINTO FACTORY.

This time, rather than discussing technical topics, I'd like to share my experience taking paternity leave when my son was born in August this year. I'll cover the handover process at the team level and my thoughts after returning to work.

Consulting with My Manager

In April of this year, I was assigned as the team leader for the frontend team within the FACTORY E-commerce Development Group. At first, I felt a bit hesitant about being away from work for an extended period, but when I consulted with my manager, he wholeheartedly encouraged me to take paternity leave.

I was told that the first few months after birth are particularly demanding for mothers, both physically and mentally, so I should try to support my wife as much as possible.

So I applied for about two months of paternity leave, with the plan to reassess after one month whether I could return early.

Handover Items

Now, when it came to handing over my daily responsibilities, in addition to my regular frontend development work, as team leader I handled:

• Reviewing architecture for new projects, making directional decisions, and coordinating with related departments
• 1-on-1 meetings with each team member
• Semi-annual reviews and evaluations with each team member
• Recruiting activities

Let me go into detail on each of these.

Reviewing architecture for new projects, making directional decisions, and coordinating with related departments

After regularly checking the roadmap with the PdMs and my manager for late August when my leave was scheduled to start, it turned out there weren't any major new projects coming up and most were already in progress.

So I started documenting the projects I had been handling in Confluence, making it a habit to briefly summarize things like "who I discussed this with and what was decided" and "what I've completed so far."

1-on-1 meetings with each team member
Semi-annual reviews and evaluations with each team member

Next was the management area.
One of my missions as team leader was to review and evaluate each team member's progress on a semi-annual basis.

That review period was going to overlap directly with my leave period, so from the start of the April term, I had each team member set their goals in advance to make the reviews go smoothly.

In practice, each member would record their goals and write monthly updates in Confluence about "what they accomplished and what they plan to do next month," which served as discussion topics for our 1-on-1s.
I also made notes in that same Confluence page about things I noticed and the efforts I appreciated, so I could provide feedback during reviews.

Since I was planning to take leave around the time of the birth, I figured that if my leave overlapped with the evaluation period, I could simply hand over that Confluence page to my manager, allowing him to quickly review each member's goals and achievements.

Recruiting activities

For this, I basically asked my manager to take over.

However, I wanted the development team members to get a sense of candidates' technical skills and communication abilities from the interview stage, so I had them join interviews to check on communication and technical skills at the team level.

During My Leave

With most of the handover preparations in place, on August 24th, our healthy baby boy was born!

I took three days of special leave, going back and forth between local government offices and the hospital. On the day before my paternity leave officially started, I went to the office just once to return my company equipment (PC, phone, employee badge, etc.).
From there, for about two months, I stepped back from work and fully committed to taking care of my baby!

Childcare Is Tough

The FACTORY E-commerce Development Group has plenty of experienced dads, and before the birth I'd heard all kinds of stories, but as expected, the first month was really hard.
My wife and I split childcare and sleep into half-day shifts and I handled childcare from morning until night. My wife suggested this approach, saying it would help me maintain my sleep cycle for when I returned to work, so I was basically up during the day and sleeping at night.

With feeding, diaper changes, soothing the baby, and bath time coming at me almost by the minute, I barely had any time to think about myself. I don’t think work even crossed my mind at all during the first week or two.

Still, the Service Is on My Mind

About a month into my leave, I was able to talk with my manager and get updates on project progress and the team's status. After a month of hardly going out and barely talking to anyone, it felt like a huge mental reset.

Also, by this point I'd gotten quite used to childcare, and my son was settling into longer sleep periods, so I remember occasionally checking on service updates.

KINTO FACTORY releases new products and features on Wednesdays, so every Wednesday I'd visit the site to see "what's new this month?"

The Return

And so, after 65 days of paternity leave, I returned to work in November.
There weren't any major changes to the group members, and some ongoing projects had been pushed back. Overall things hadn't changed dramatically from before my leave, so I was able to return smoothly.

However, since my wife suddenly had to handle childcare solo during the day, I try to reduce her burden by going to work as early as possible in the morning and coming home as early as possible in the evening.
This is made possible by our full-flex system. As long as I coordinate meetings and get agreement from the team, I can freely adjust my working hours.

Conclusion

By dedicating myself to childcare during the first two months, I was able to witness my son’s growth up close, from his very first smiles to his little coos and all the small changes he made day by day. Being so involved during this period felt like an incredibly precious experience.

I was only able to have this experience because my manager and everyone in the group warmly sent me off on paternity leave. I'd like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude.

At KINTO Technologies, I believe it's an environment where men can take paternity leave without difficulty. In fact, I've heard that many male engineers across different divisions have taken paternity leave just this year alone (there are many kids the same age as my son in the company!).
I hope this is helpful for anyone preparing to take paternity leave or getting ready to return to work.

Also, the article below introduces a day in the life of an experienced dad in the same FACTORY E-commerce Development Group, so please check that out too!

A Must-Read for Parent Engineers! A Day in the Life of a KTC Dad Engineer