Taking Care of Baby Can Be Good for Business

Article Overview

Work-life balance has become a front-line issue for companies in the effort to retain a highly skilled workforce. This article outlines the current state of play and offers principles for HR leaders to consider when initiating or further developing their work-life balance policies

Takeouts

Evidence shows that flexible and enlightened working practices are good for business. Achieving a balance between the needs of home and work is a win-win for families and employers. Companies that cater for the demands of working parents enjoy higher staff morale and better productivity.
Any change to current work/life balance policy requires a rigorous process of analysis and change management to ensure a solid return on investment. For employees to experience the ‘soft’ benefits of flexible working, hard numbers must be crunched by employers to determine where the greatest business impact lies.

Australians now work the longest hours in the developed world – more than 200 hours per year above the global average, equivalent to an additional five working weeks per year ^[1]. Little wonder then that many workers are caught in a spiral of longer work hours, growing job insecurity, increased work stress and family responsibilities.

All too often, parents want to spend more time with their family but fear being labelled uncommitted^[2]. The recent “What Working Families Want” survey commissioned by GlaxoSmithKline found that a long-hours work culture had a serious adverse affect on working parents, 49% of whom said long hours affected their morale to some extent^[3] . The survey also reported that the most important thing employers can do to help people juggle their personal and job responsibilities is to change corporate culture so that a more acceptable work-life balance can be sustained.

But in Australia, employers have been slow to act. Only 28% of employers surveyed for Managing Work/Life Balance’s 2005 “Way Ahead” report said they provided a work environment in which employees could determine their own work schedules in a way that accommodated their lifestyle demands^[4].

Despite the fact that Paid Maternity Leave (PML) is acknowledged as an international human right, Australia and the US are the only two countries in the OECD who do not currently have compulsory PML. A survey of Australia’s 100 largest public companies revealed that only 36% provide PML, an increase of 23% in two years^[5].

Many working parents also face significant challenges around the issue of child care. The chronic shortage of places is exacerbated by the fact that child care workers are vastly underpaid. Only 5% of all childcare places in Australia are employer-sponsored^[6] .

Both the lack of compulsory PML and the childcare shortage are exacerbated by an inbuilt cultural resistance to viewing private responsibilities as an employer’s problem, even among working parents themselves. Almost half of those surveyed in the What Working Families Want Survey said they were mostly responsible for balancing work and home priorities themselves^[7].

Family-friendly practices are good for business

Anne Hatton, CEO of Hudson A/NZ, advocates that “attracting, securing and retaining the best talent will be the most important business issue over the next 20 years…those organisations that don’t embrace flexible work policies to expand their talent pool will be overtaken by more forward thinking competitors.”^[8]

Progressive Australian businesses are now offering women comprehensive maternity leave arrangements, including keeping in touch during leave, bringing them back for training seminars, and offering flexible return-to-work options. The results are increased retention rates, and improved productivity.

Qantas is trialling a national childcare program because they were losing 700 staff members each year to parental leave. Esso, The Body Shop and AMP have reaped the benefits of providing childcare for their employees’ children through lower absenteeism, better morale and improved job performance.

Becoming a family-friendly employer

So how can employers not only provide the flexibility that working parents require, but also build the culture that supports a positive work/life balance? These three simple steps are an effective starting point:

Review the options available;
Re-educate your people;
Review and Report on what is (and isn’t) working.

1. Review

Before you rush into requesting extra office space for a work-based childcare centre complete with breastfeeding rooms and the latest in after-school care, realise that no two family-friendly workplaces look exactly the same. If you haven’t already got an employee committee that represents the cross-section of all staff then one should be created with work/life balance issues as part of their charter.

A wealth of information on family-friendly, flexible work practices exists – the challenge is to know which is most appropriate for your workforce. Here are some flexible work options to consider^[9]:

Part-time work
Flexi-time (short-term build-up of hours – normally for a nine day fortnight).
Time Off in Lieu (TOIL)
Job sharing or job splitting (different job functions are performed by different employees)
Work from home/telecommuting
Term time or school hours working (for parents of young school-aged children)
Annual hours (uneven spread of hours throughout the year with core and banked hours)
Compressed hours (e.g. 4½ day week or nine day fortnight)
Career breaks (e.g. maternity leave) or sabbaticals

What works for one person will not necessarily work for another. The challenge is to match your current and predicted workforce with the best-fit flexible options. Survey your staff to discern which options are most favoured by the majority of people before selecting which practices you will introduce.

2. Re-educate

In setting out to change a culture, you take on a task with many challenges. Unless there is widespread dissatisfaction with the status quo, a clear picture of what the future looks like, and an approved pilot program strongly championed by senior management, you are likely to encounter pockets of resistance.

Once the range of flexible working options has been selected, develop a communication plan to ‘sell’ the new initiatives. The goal is to persuade the ‘middle mass’ (about 70%) of your workforce, who tend to be neutral about most issues, towards your point of view. If you accept that it will take several years (and sometimes generational change in roles) to bring about genuine cultural shifts, then you can take a more realistic position on how long it may take for the full benefits of your initiatives to be realised.

3. Review and Report

When it comes to work/life balance, you need to allow time for patterns to emerge. Depending on the starting point and size of your pilot group, it can take up to two years before meaningful data starts to emerge (especially when maternity leave is included in the program). Use the formal performance review system as well as anonymous surveys to capture both hard and soft data on the important metrics. These can be anything from numbers returning after maternity leave to percentage of annual leave taken relative to increases in personal productivity skills. Of particular interest are any statistics that demonstrate cost savings over expenditure (e.g. a decrease in recruitment costs, lower sick/stress leave requests).

When you have meaningful data, then don’t hesitate to report it to the powers that be and celebrate success stories with the entire company. This lends increased weight to future work/life balance planning and enhancements.

Conclusion

Any organisation that wants to get the most from its employees needs to take an active approach to the work-life balance debate. The cost of absenteeism and a demotivated workforce can be enormous. Conversely, enlightened policies breed loyalty, commitment and effort. Helping staff to balance their work and home lives aids retention, can increase productivity and, in the war for talent, can be an important aid to recruitment.

Written by Victoria Small and Edited by Paul Quinn, Quinntessential Marketing Consulting Pty Ltd.

Disclaimer:

The views and opinions expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the view of Norwest Recruitment.

The views and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the view of Norwest Recruitment. This information is a general summary of the subject matter and should not be relied upon. You should not use this information as the sole basis for decisions or in place of professional advice.

References

“20th of November: Take-the-rest-of-the-year-off-day”, Australia Institute Media Release, Nov 19 2004 (www.tai.org.au)
War Over Work Book Description http://www.mup.unimelb.edu.au/catalogue/0-522-85170-3.html
What Working Families Want Survey http://www.personneltoday.com/Articles/2005/03/22/28754/Parents+take+responsibility+for+work-life+balance+issues.htm
Managing Work/Life Balance 2005 Survey Executive Summary http://www.worklifebalance.com.au/pdfs/mwlb2005execsum.pdf
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/The-baby-or-the-briefcase/2005/03/31/1111862534267.html
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/The-baby-or-the-briefcase/2005/03/31/1111862534267.html
What Working Families Want Survey http://www.personneltoday.com/Articles/2005/03/22/28754/Parents+take+responsibility+for+work-life+balance+issues.htm
Quoted in HR Monthly, September 2005: AHRI, Melbourne, p.22
http://www.workingfamilies.org.uk/asp/employer_zone/e_employees.asp