In this article we analyse the challenges women in senior positions face during their academic careers in Chile. Forty-eight senior professors from seven Chilean universities were interviewed in-depth. The results showed that it is challenging for these women to balance the activities of academic work, i.e. teaching, research, service, and management work, in a context marked by neoliberalism. Female professors experienced an over-assignment of teaching and service work. Due to the importance assigned to scientific productivity in Chile’s neoliberal academia, the women interviewed took on additional work and personal sacrifice compared to their male counterparts, which required them to use their personal time to engage in more valued activities. Consequently, senior female professors had careers characterized by a high workload and, thus, experienced conflicts of conciliation between academic work and personal lives. Therefore, the way academic duties are assigned had repercussions on these women’s professional careers and personal lives.