For many Australian women, a high-powered career with great earning potential where you can negotiate large deals yet still have the flexibility for school drop-offs and pick-ups seems like an illusion. In many workplaces, returning to work after taking time off to have a baby can be difficult. Indeed, the number of complaints to the Australian Human Rights Commission and Fair Work Australia from parents facing discrimination about returning to their jobs after taking parental leave was so significant that, in 2013, the Federal government ordered a national review. This year, the Australian Human Rights Commission is set to launch a project aiming to maximize the participation of women in the Australian workforce.

For Linda Johnson, sales manager at LJ Hooker Mosman on Sydney’s leafy north shore, the real estate industry offers the independence and flexibility she needs to manage a large team and motherhood. “I won’t lie, I shed a little tear when I left her,” said Johnson last week of leaving her six-month-old daughter with a relative so she could return to work full-time this month. “But it does get easier. This is my third day back. As a working Mum, you can have the best of both worlds because of the flexibility the job provides. My advice there is when you’re at work, you’re at work, and when you’re at home, you’re at home. I have a few non-negotiables: I need to be home to give her her last bottle and put her to bed, and then of course I get up really early, 5am, so I get to spend quality time with her in the morning before I go to work. On Fridays I work from home”

Johnson believes the real estate industry is one where women excel. “I think it’s naturally suited to our personality types, being empathetic to people’s situations. Real estate transactions come from births, deaths and marriages, and we have a natural empathy in dealing with those situations,” she says. “We have a tough side as well as a soft side. There’s a lot of emotion involved in a real estate transaction.”

She began her career 18 years ago as a personal assistant to the director at Raine & Horne Bondi Beach. Before that, she had worked in the finance and beauty industries. “I started helping the director with his listings and sales and just accidentally found myself as a sales agent,” she says. “I was living one block from the beach so it was a great lifestyle.” Johnson then moved to Bathurst, where she worked as a sales agent. “It was a completely different market. Out there it was essentially all private treaty, very rarely an auction, dealing with acreage as well as residential homes and heritage properties.” After several years in Bathurst, Johnson returned to Sydney and to Raine & Horne Bondi Beach as Director of Operations. When that business was sold, she moved to LJ Hooker.

Johnson’s office was the number one office in the worldwide LJ Hooker network of more than 700 offices in 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014. In her three years at LJ Hooker, Johnson says last financial year was the best. Living locally in Crows Nest, Johnson oversees all aspects of the residential sales business including operations, management, finance, technology, human resources, marketing, administration, training, events, team performance and development. “I love the transaction, realizing people’s dreams and getting to the crux of what it is they really want to achieve,” she says.

And while the industry does provide the perfect flexibility for working mothers, that doesn't mean it's an easy job. “We used to have a saying, that as an agent, you get a pat on the back, a desk and a phone. That’s not the way to do business in today’s world,” Johnson says. “It’s an amazing industry, but it is bloody hard and you’ve got to start from scratch and do the time. One in a million agents write a million dollars in their first three years. It generally takes five to ten years to become an established agent.”