Written by Eloise Spearman | Client Services Manager
In November last year, a survey by the Fawcett Society estimated that around 250,000 mothers with young children had left their jobs because of difficulties with balancing work and childcare. The UK has one of the most expensive childcare systems in the world, with some parents spending as much as 80% of their take-home pay on care for young children.
In this blog, we’ll share ideas about how employers can help ease childcare stresses, so that working parents are able to balance their family lives while keeping their career progression plates spinning.
Understanding the childcare landscape
In our conversations with returning parents, very few of them actually mention things like on-site workplace creche; parents are realists and know that most employers aren’t able to offer this. What they do value is employers making a genuine effort to understand the pressures they face, and making changes where they can.
The number of childcare providers in England dropped by about 4,000 between March 2021 and March 2022, according to the Office for National Statistics. Therefore, parents often take whatever childcare is on offer, regardless of whether the hours actually work around their working commitments.
One mum told us how her employer is addressing this:
“Our HR lead recognised that times have changed since she had young children and that a lot of parents’ nursery hours are nine until three – which is the only way nurseries could survive the financial repercussions of the pandemic. She amended the flexible working practice so that core hours allowed time for nursery pick ups.”
Addressing biases
We also hear about unconscious – and often well-meaning – bias from line managers and senior leaders, who don’t always understand that parents’ circumstances may be very different to their own experiences.
For example, many colleagues are surprised to hear that working parents aren’t able to call upon grandparents and family networks for childcare. With many grandparents now working well into their 60s, as well as providing ‘sandwich care’ for their own elderly parents, family networks aren’t as readily available today. Parents – particularly those in academic or specialist fields – have often moved location for their careers and are more isolated from family networks.
One mum told us:
“Our senior leaders think that we're doing really well, but they're quite removed from peoples’ lived experience. The senior leaders that do have children, they tend to have progressed their careers later on when their children are older and they have more stability.”
Listening to lived experiences
We recently spoke to an EDI Manager about how a series of focus groups run by her organisation to inform its flexible working strategy generated some unexpected common themes:
She said: “We ran lots of focus groups to help identify what we would put forward in our recommendations. I expected people to pick the common themes – for example, partners leave and length of maternity leave.
Actually, very few people wanted a longer maternity leave. Partners leave came up for obvious reasons - I mean, two weeks just isn't enough. But the main topic that came up again and again and again was the cost of childcare, and being able to return to work in the way that you want to return.
This wasn’t necessarily a surprise, but I didn’t realise how much of the feedback there would be on this topic. It wasn't so much on the amount of leave you could have, it was getting back to work and progressing in your job. Or just being able to balance everything while being at work.”
Flexible working: removing barriers
The ability to work flexibility is often key to a successful return to work after parental leave. However, employers should be mindful that HR policies around flexible working can negatively impact working parents. One mum told us:
“At my organisation, we’re only allowed to put in one flexible working request per year; so, when you come back from maternity leave, that is your one request. It's very difficult to know when putting together your initial proposal whether it will work for you and your family life. What if you start that work pattern, and it just doesn't work for you? Based on the HR policy, you have no option at all to put in a further request.”
We spoke to an HR director in higher education about her institution’s approach to flexible working:
“We’ve been trying to change the way we approach flexible working and the way we publicize it. Particularly thinking about how we can define roles in terms of what flexibility they can offer, rather than waiting for people to request it. So, plan flexibility into job roles in advance, so that that anybody can take advantage of it.”
Family-friendly workplaces where parents will thrive
We help organisations create inclusive, family-friendly workplaces that new parents will want to return to, and where they will stay and develop their careers. Get in touch to book a free scoping call and let's start a conversation about engaging returning parents in your organisation.