Have a Seat with the C-Suite, Vol. 15
Maternity leave is, at this point, an outdated and insufficient benefit to employees. In fact, the United States is the only developed country without a law instituting paid family leave. Most women think that taking maternity leave is a risky choice for their careers and continued promotion. Currently, tech companies are leading the way in terms of far more progressive and equitable family leave policies. And, since extended, flexible, fully-funded family leaves are strongly associated with women’s career advancement, this week’s roundup offers a few resources to help education organization and leaders think about – or rethink – paid family leave.
Try: Checklist for Evaluating Leave & Flexibility Benefits in the Workplace - Are they equitable to both men and women?
I’m a huge fan of checklists (as are the other ladies in the C-Suite) and this one is particularly great. It gives you five categories or lenses through which to think about your organization’s paid family policies: flexible work schedule options, sick leave usage practices, vacation/paid time off usage practices, maternity leave & paternity leave, and culture. Each one is equally important and each category includes several additional questions that may prompt improvements within your own policies. As the article concludes: “This is not a women’s issue. It’s a workplace issue. It’s a business issue. It’s a parental issue that impacts mothers and fathers equally.” Everyone benefits from paid family leave policies and organizations tend to thrive when such policies are instated.
Read: Time to Talk: What has to change for women at work
This report is a substantive and data-rich read, but it is worth the time you’ll invest. PwC, an accounting firm, and several of its associates have authored this report on women in the workplace. They began by distributing a survey to women working in leadership positions in order to assess the women’s perceptions of their jobs, careers, and aspirations. Germane to this week’s discussion is the number of women who fear the effect a family may have on their careers: 42% “feel nervous about the impact that having children might have on [their careers].” More staggering still, “48% of new mothers said they were overlooked for career advancement because they had children.” The report also moves from mere assessment to problem-solving and discusses at length the ways in which networks dedicated to women’s must tackle each of the current, prominent deficits in women’s career pathways: mentorship, pay, transparency, and support for caregiving. I particularly appreciate the detailed look at so-called flexible work hours, which are often touted as a solution to the particular work-life balance women tend to juggle. However, women still fear that taking advantage of flexibility programs will harm their careers in the long-term and one female senior director states, “We need to de-parent, de-gender, and de-age the perception around flexible working. It is critical that we encourage candid conversation about work and family, especially among men, and at the leadership level.” In fact the report identifies “prerequisites for success” that serve as a blueprint for organizational improvements that benefit all genders: 1) transparency and trust, 2) support networks, and 3) conversations about caregiving.
Share: The economics of the “Mommy Track” explain why parental leave isn’t enough
I’ve read all of the information in this article so far and yet the presentation and logic were so good that its thesis immediately became a topic of several of my conversations. The author posits that individuals launch careers in leadership or management at about the same time women choose to have a child (and often to step away from work, even temporarily).
“The costs and benefits of taking leave are different for men and for women. For example, women who give birth must recover from the physical strains put on their bodies during pregnancy and delivery, which time off from work allows them to do. While men can enjoy other benefits of leave—such as early bonding time with their child—they cannot reap those physical benefits of parental leave. Therefore a woman will always be more likely to take leave than a man, all else equal. This also means that a woman who takes parental leave may be more likely to prioritize work highly than a man who does not. So the proxy itself imperfect.”
So, in order to make decisions about promotions, organizations attempt to assess an individual’s dedication and qualification. Yet the very mechanisms for making these assessments are flawed and privilege the people who are less likely to have to prove they’re dedicated or qualified. This means that women are burdened with the choice of either starting a family or facing an essentially insurmountable professional gap between themselves and their male peers. Paid family leaves for all spouses – male or female – is one way to address this, but as the article states, only about 1% of eligible male parents take advantage of paid family leave. One solution to provide parents of all genders a fair shot in the workforce is to mandate or incentivize individuals taking all leave available to them. This is a choice pattern called pooling equilibrium and in this case, the taking of leave does not signal “anything about the degree to which those new parents prioritize work” because every new parent takes leave. A simple solution in theory perhaps, but I’m interested to know how organizations would enforce this. As you share this with your social media network, consider asking how your friends and colleagues might implement such a policy.
Lead: How To Improve Your Company’s Parental Leave - Like These Women At The Times
Unbeknownst to me, the New York Times’ very competitive family leave policy was initiated and shepherded to completion by two female VPs at the organization. Fairygodboss conducted an interview with the two women, which suggests a number of resources to leaders and allies who wish to elevate their leave policies and subsequently attract and hire even more stellar candidates. I’ve distilled some of their recommendations into leader-friendly prompts:
- Consider the formal and informal networks in your organization focused on the career development and success of women. If such networks exist, are they led by women and focused on the issues most salient to the work and lives of women in the organization? If they do not exist, why not? What barriers to interest or access may exist and how can you reduce those?
Collect ample support when proposing policy changes. How might the policy change benefit the organization as well as the individuals – in this case, individuals taking extended parental or paid family leave? What challenges or arguments is the proposal likely to face?
Create a culture that celebrates taking leave. It is not enough to simply change a policy (as seen in the previous articles) because all employees need to be visible and celebrated when they take leave, which means they cannot fear for either their employment or advancement possibilities. Does your organization share, encourage, incentivize, or celebrate taking all available leave?
- Lauren