Mom's Best way for Choosing Nanny

My husband always wanted me to be stay at home mom and take care of our kids. I have been doing this since last 7-8 years and enjoyed each and every moment of feeding, napping, educating, and playing responsibilities. Now recently I got an interesting assignment to work on and they want me to start working at office for 4-5 hours a day. The world has turned upside down since then. After numerous all night discussion with my husband, I decided to start looking out for a nanny for my kids till the time I am away from home. Butthe thoughts I had were like where to see, how to handover the kids to nanny, will she be a good fit, etc. I wanted a checklist kind of thing to make sure I am not missing something vital while selecting care taker for my kids, while I am away at work.

Top considerations for Nanny Selection

First check why you want a nanny and what your priorities are. Think what are the qualities you seek - like older nanny with lot of experience in child care, some specific language speaking nanny (for expats situation), someone closeby, etc. These considerations will help you in getting the right person as a nanny who will fit to your concerns and priorities both.
Spread the word about your requirement of a nanny. Check with your friends group, extended family, etc for any references. May be try putting up some notice on school board, coffee shops, etc. Online advertising like craigslist.com can also help in spreading the requirement. You might want to check the nanny agencies as well, but they charge commission.
Have all your concerns and questions ready before starting to interview the nannies. These questions can be about their past experiences with babies, kids and children. Check on how When you they handle crying kids, how do they establish connect with child, what all they know about ailing child and first aid, etc. You might want to check their discipling style as well along with certification they have done - like in first aid, etc.
After you finalize on few of the nannies post interview, check about the references and past employers feedback. Check about the dependability, capabilities, and how the nanny dealt with children. Check for any weaknesses and why they have asked her to go.
5. Take some visual signs also like were you comfortable with the person, are they looking at you or while talking or they are just shying here and there, are they looking kind, caring and impressive, etc are some of the things which you should rely on your intuitions for determine.
Check for the contract you sign with the nanny. Also have a clause of seeing the nanny for first few days and then decide about the offer.

Alternates for Nanny based Childcare

The alternates are creche, day childcare centers, which offer good professional set of child care experts, but have high cost and fairly inflexible opening hours.
You can also try home daycare which offers a homelike environment and has lesser number of kids with usually flexible hours.
If nothing works out, then check with professionals to help find more options.

Care while keeping Nanny with kids

1. Be sure to check every now and then with a surprize visit to your home.
2. For first few days, opt for work for home, so as to check on the child handling skills of new nanny.
3. Check the price at different centers before commiting any price to nanny.
4. Check and take care of goods and valuables at home while you are away, so that the at home nanny does not look out for them instead of child care.