Parenthood at work: why different perspectives are crucial

Parenthood is challenging and is an incredibly transformative period in any individuals' life. When you become a parent, your priorities shift, as well as your outlook on work. Beyond the existing stigma associated with parents, the qualities of parents can have a positive impact in working environments, and they’re not spoken about enough.

We are proud to have a diverse workforce, as well as many individuals who juggle the challenges of a career as well as being a parent. Generally, parenthood is viewed as a blocker for someone’s career, especially if they are in a high-intensity role or a single parent. 

In reality, being a parent is an enriching experience that allows people to bring new perspectives to work, and view situations through the lens of motherhood or fatherhood.

The dangers of a homogenous workforce

In the workplace, a homogenous workforce stifles creativity and reduces room for growth. If we have a business made up of the same personalities, social circles, ages, and family backgrounds, we run the risk of losing diversity of thought!

An article by Sodexo Engage highlighted that “studies have shown that a flexible, family-friendly workplace can motivate staff, reduce staff turnover, help attract new staff, reduce workplace stress, and generally enhance worker satisfaction and productivity”. 

Parents can bring new perspectives, such as enhanced communication skills and emotional intelligence. These can include non-verbal cues in a meeting or challenging conversations with various levels of seniority.

Young children are still learning to verbalise emotions, which, in turn, makes parents well-versed in reading these emotions, which can then be applied in the workplace.

Olivia Foskett, our Marketing Assistant in the UK, highlighted that communication has been the most significant change for her:

“With children, we talk about using ‘simple’ language, but really when we speak to children we say what we actually mean. You remove ego or pretension from your language, which makes you a clearer communicator. This is directly applicable in the workplace and works wonders!”

Niko Knechtel, our Regional Associate Director in the USA, explained that for him, it directly relates to leadership and looking after the wider team:

“You never truly realise how selfish you were until you have a child! It teaches you to put your employees first, especially as a leader, and show them that you’re human. We make mistakes, we aren’t perfect - and they aren’t expected to be either. 

In addition to this, we need to nurture our children, as we do with our employees, but we also need to show some tough love at times for them to come to their realisations of what they might need to further learn and improve on.” 

These two perspectives are small snippets of what it means to be a parent at work, and it’s crucial that we try and understand the key benefits of being a parent, whilst recognising that it’ll be different for every person. 

How can you support parents in your organisation

When we think about supporting parents, it can be easy to become prescriptive and talk about policies, and policies only. And, although they are great and absolutely necessary, they shouldn’t put parents into any type of box. 

In reality, supporting parents can come in many different shapes and forms. Whether that’s helping someone prepare for leave and ensuring they have emotional support, or creating a workflow that supports flexible work schedules, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach. 
Your initiatives will differ depending on your organisation and the types of parents or guardians you have in your team, however, here are three ways that you can get started:

Offer flexibility

This will look different for each parent, so you have to speak with them individually to find what will work. Children don’t exist on a strict schedule, so flexible working hours can cut out the stress of not being able to get to them if they’re sick, need to be dropped at school, or if childcare falls through.

Ensure your career ladder/progression structure is clear

Not only does this create a fair environment and clearer metrics for individuals to strive for, it directly supports parents as they are consistently reminded that they will always have the ability to progress, no matter their hours or the time that they take off. Making your progression structure meritocratic enables inclusivity and trust amongst employees.

Acknowledge them

You should always strive to be supportive and communicative about stressful and emotional periods in life. 

A great time when parents may need additional acknowledgement and support is when children go back to school. It’s a big routine change for all involved, so some additional aid around this time, such as delegating tasks fairly among teams, can ease workload and level of expectation.

Upskill the wider team

Just because someone isn’t a parent in your organisation, doesn’t mean they should be excluded from unconscious bias training, or simply learning about the flexibilities offered and why they are in place. 

Especially after being locked down and in a pandemic, upskilling your team on unconscious bias or even how they can help to support parents within the organisation can foster a more inclusive and understanding environment. 

And finally,  work on your culture and what that really means to the parents in your workplace. Inclusion is a feeling, not about policy, and having this mindset will enable you to do more in your organisation outside the statutory policies.

You can achieve so much more not only with the support of your leadership team, but by embedding empathy, compassion, and education into the lifeblood of your organisation.