How employers can better support parents at work

Many jobs in global development require professionals to work away from home for large segments of time. Starting a family in this scenario is not ideal — if not impossible — and many professionals have to make a hard choice, some even giving up their careers. In most countries, the responsibility often falls on women to stay at home and be the primary caregiver, at least for the first few years of a child’s life. “As a mom — regardless what your role or your work is — you always feel like you’re failing something: Failing your child, you’re failing yourself, you’re failing your job,” said Debbie Santalesa, emergency preparedness and planning manager at CARE International. It’s demanding, being a parent alongside pursuing a career, especially so for development professionals whose work often involves frequent travel. On returning to work, women in global development have found it hard to balance their parental and job responsibilities. Some may only take a few years off but then find it extremely difficult to break back into the sector with a gap on their resume. Devex spoke with a number of women in development to get their take on what organizations can do to support mothers — and fathers — in continuing work, even once they have small children. 1. Realize the value of parents as development professionals, don’t exclude them Mothers are, of course, incredibly well-versed on the needs of children and families, they bring an important alternative perspective as development professionals. Organizations first need to recognize the value that mothers bring to the sector — and then push for transformations that better support them. “When I returned after having my own child … I was so much better able to meet the needs and have discussions with the women in the population,” Santalesa said. “I looked at things differently, I was much more aware of what we were providing [and] whether they would really meet the children’s needs — which I would have never looked at before.” Although Santalesa noticed an increasing number of women entering the humanitarian sector, there are not many mothers — which she feels is a gap. As a mother, Santalesa was able to ask “better questions to really get at what they’re [other mothers] needing — in terms of food, nutrition, whatever the situation may be — that I would never have even thought of, prior to that.” While working in Burundi, Allison Burden, head of gender equality at CARE International, had a similar experience. “When I took my baby around the country and was breastfeeding her, you know, I had amazing conversations with people about nutrition, about sanitation — all sorts of conversations! And it bonded me in ways with women, that probably I wouldn’t have been, had I been the multipocketed aid worker without the baby,” Burden said. Some automatically assume parents with young children won’t take up roles that require traveling abroad: “I’ve had this happen to me on several occasions,” Santalesa echoed. But organizations should ask, rather than make assumptions. “When women or other colleagues have children, don’t automatically discount them out. Ask them if they’d be interested in those roles … and let them decide for themselves,” she advised. 2. Be flexible on the amount of time required in the field “A lot of places expect to see you in-country at some point,” explained Tessa Gough, currently on maternity leave from CARE International as an emergency specialist focused on water, sanitation, and hygiene — also undertaking her doctorate. While Gough has been able to land a few remote consultancy gigs, they are few and far between. More remote consultancy positions would help support a lot of caregivers to continue working. “There are probably so many people sat at home with skills and experience that, for one reason or another, can’t travel but could be useful… It seems like it’s a missed opportunity,” she said. Santalesa agreed on changing the percentage of required travel time — CARE requires disaster response staff to be deployed for 60-65 percent of the year and other organizations’ requirements are even greater. “There’s no way you’re going to get an experienced person, with a family with small children, in that role,” she stated. Even staff without children quit because they are burnt out, Santalesa continued, “organizationally, we need to change. If you want to get women — particularly with children — you have to change that percentage of deployment.” One way to do so is to rotate people, Santalesa suggested. Particularly for disaster response teams, rotating staff on deployment is one simple way to reduce the amount of time each individual is required in the field — and will help the number of people who “quit halfway through deployment.” “Organizationally, people have to change their mindset to say, ‘we should be rotating people every four to six weeks anyway, because they’re getting burnt out,’” Santalesa finished. “There are probably so many people sat at home with skills and experience that, for one reason or another, can’t travel but could be useful… It seems like it’s a missed opportunity.” --— Tessa Gough, emergency specialist focused on water, sanitation, and hygiene at CARE International 3. Remote coaching and mentoring Before stopping work for maternity leave, Gough joined the RedR UK trainer pool. RedR UK provides training for aid workers, NGOs, and communities on how to prepare and respond to disasters. This gave her the ability to continue working from home as a remote coach, even once she had her child. Coaching and mentoring are great ways to stay connected to the industry and support someone who’s in the field, Gough said. “A lot of people felt they could talk to me. And it helped them learn by being able to ask questions,” she said. And being somewhat removed from an organization’s team meant that the members could ask questions without the fear of being judged or it reflecting badly on their abilities. “Having that slight outsider space, meant that I could actually help quite a lot of people in a way that they couldn’t necessarily get from their colleagues or they didn’t feel able to access in their offices. So, I think the remote coach thing and the remote support thing of handing on that information and experience is a brilliant idea,” Gough continued. However, coaching roles are not common in development work. “I haven’t really come across it [before], this is the first time and I think it’s quite new for RedR … but it makes so much sense,” she said. 4. Headquarter roles and career progression As well as offering more remote positions and mentoring, Santalesa added that organizations should be fitting in more parents at headquarters and rotating those from headquarters out into the field. “You lose a lot of people because they feel like there’s nowhere to go in HQ,” Santalesa said. Organizations should be supporting career progression and development for their staff, including addressing the lack of women in leadership. “As organizations, we all need to really take a look at our systems, our policies, the way we’re structured and what we’re doing systematically — internally as one organization, and as a sector,” she said. “We need to figure out how we can move people around at different phases of their lives, so that they’re able to manage their personal situation,” Santalesa finished. 5. Open discussions “Definitely talk to your organization … and actually understand what their expectations are and what position they can make [to accommodate your needs],” Gough advised. If you’re planning a family, simply ask — it’s very possible “they’ve got more experience of it than we realize, as individuals, and they might be able to come up with an equitable solution,” Gough added. Santalesa made it clear “that I could not be deployed for more than four to six weeks at a time, and they made it work.” Organizations have the capacity to adapt positions to suit their staff and should be having these discussions if they are to hold onto their valued team members. “[The] more people that start to have that open and honest conversation, the more organizations will start to look at their policies, and perhaps, they’ll realize that they need to be a bit more explicit or transparent on what the possibilities are,” Santalesa continued. A report by ActionAid and CARE International, echoed this, “[a]gencies that do make allowances for child care should ensure that all staff are aware of the policies and can draw on these without having to feel as though they are making a special request.” With many development roles, such as disaster response teams and consultants, the difficulty is working on short-term contracts. “if you’re doing deployments which are a few months at a time, you really don’t have the job security to talk to someone,” Santalesa said. And once you reach the end of your contract, it’s likely you won’t be kept on. Gough explained, “it’s really advocating with organizations that parenthood takes time and will need different circumstances.” Santalesa echoed, “raising awareness and really having these conversations is a really good start … but then we really need to start to act and do things.” 6. More flexibility: Supporting families on deployment “There are certain emergencies and certain places you can go where you could possibly bring your child,” Santalesa highlighted. Burden said, while organizations are very conscious of risk, they need to be more open to the diverse ways of deployment for women with children. At times, Burden added, a baby can add to the experience and help the organization to connect better with other mothers on the ground. “So, just be open a little bit,” she advised organizations. For families with young children, where it’s too risky to situate them in-country, Burden suggested basing the family in a nearby country. While acknowledging that this adds an issue of risk and resources for the organization, Burden emphasized the need to have these discussions and to work out what is plausible and what can be offered. Santalesa also advocated better staff benefits, such as helping to pay for the child and a caregiver — whether a partner or nanny — to go too. “There’s different benefits that can be offered to people,” organizations just need to take the time to work out what they are, Santalesa finished. 7. Onsite child care facilities Another way to support parents returning to work is to provide onsite child care facilities for staff children. This has been implemented by a few organizations already and it’s an excellent way to encourage and support parents in feeling more comfortable and confident returning to work. If parents are physically close to their child, it can eliminate some of the fear or guilt of leaving them. “One of the things that we could do is look at creche facilities and child care. We’ve done that in our development work, I know Oxfam has a great creche in Oxfam house, here in the U.K. — [and] we’ve done it in our country office in Bangladesh,” said Burden. The organization doesn’t have to fully fund the child care in all cases but can simply donate the space within the work premises while parents pay for the child care. “And that then enables staff to, very quickly, go and breastfeed and come back. Or if there’s a real problem, the baby’s there,” Burden said. In some contexts, organizations could make relatively simple and easy adaptations to accommodate their staff. “If you think about the adaptations we would make for someone who was differently-abled, with ramps or with software in their computers [for those visually impaired] … it’s the same thing.” 8. Human resources need to ignore gaps in parents’ resumes Santalesa explained that in order to have her child, she had to leave the field for five to six years. She managed to get back into the field through an opportunity from a personal connection. “It was really hard to get back in because I’d been gone. “HR needs to stop looking at when people have gaps in their CVs — particularly women — and need to recognize that, just because maybe they took time off to raise a child, doesn’t mean they’re incompetent when they come back.” “Just because maybe they [parents] took time off to raise a child, doesn’t mean they’re incompetent when they come back.” --— Debbie Santalesa, emergency preparedness and planning manager at CARE International 9. Parental Leave: Parenthood applies to men too As much as the expectation often falls on the mother, fathers equally feel the pressure to continue work once they start a family. “I think a lot of men are under pressure. I had colleagues who had very young children, or partners that were about to have a child, and they were still going out into the field and still working all hours that God sends, and I think that they felt that they couldn’t slow down either,” added Gough. “Really, my advice is to talk to the organization you’re with, but for men and women equally to advocate for this, for everyone’s benefit,” said Gough. Burden agreed that partners need to be more involved. At CARE, they encourage staff to bring in partners for a conversation “about the expectations of work and how partners can support that,” Burden said. While the United States’ family and medical leave act mandates only three months of maternity leave which “doesn’t have to be paid,” Santalesa advised organizations to take note from other more supportive country initiatives. Burden added that Norwegian law offers one year “parental leave” divided between both parents, and men are required to take at least three months of that — otherwise, they lose it. Providing parental leave to both mothers and fathers helps level the playing field so that finding solutions for working parents aren’t seen as just a woman’s problem, reducing the stigma often associated with being a mom.