I hang out with the working moms, and I’m one of them – I’ve been one for over 20 years. And throughout my career, there’s been a lot of talk about how responsive employers are – or aren’t, or should be – to the needs of their employees with families. There’s also been related talk about how accommodations to these employees might slight employees who don’t have those needs. For every action, an equal and opposite reaction.
Lisa Takeuchi Cullen at Time’s Work in Progress blog cites an article in the trade publication HR Magazine (aimed at corporate HR professionals, members of the Society for Human Resources Management) that asks “Is Your Company Too Family-Friendly?”(emphasis added)
The thrust of the story is this: There’s a steadily growing population of unmarried people in the U.S. and, therefore, in the American workplace. They have rights, too. They have lives, too. They’d like access to some of the benefits extended to parents, too… The article describes a growing resentment among working singles toward working parents… I think it’s important for employers to address even a feeling of unfairness among singles. The good news is that more employers are extending more equitable environment to all employees. Researchers list five qualities of a singles-friendly workplace: • Social inclusion • Equal work opportunities • Equal access to benefits • Equal respect for nonwork life • Equal work expectations
As for those benefits, things appear to be improving: 70 percent of 326 HR executives surveyed in 2006 by CCH and Harris Interactive said their organizations offer paid-time-off programs bundling vacation, sick and personal leave into one bank of time off that employees can manage more flexibly. In addition… companies (that) offer flexible or cafeteria-benefits plans allow employees to choose from a variety of benefits and designate a set amount of money to pay for the benefits. These types of plans can allow for different lifestyles without rewarding employees having larger families with more benefits for the same job, for example.
But employers still have a blind spot when it comes to benefits for singles. A 2006 study by The Williams Institute on Sexual Orientation Law and Public Policy at the University of California-Los Angeles Law School found that 20% of same-sex domestic partners were uninsured, compared to 10% of married, heterosexual partners. But get this: a third of heterosexual, unmarried partners lacked health insurance.
Those “five qualities of a singles-friendly workplace” sound to me like they could apply to a “worker-friendly workplace,” no matter what a worker’s family status might be. A flexible PTO bank for all employees is one effective solution – my husband’s company has it, and I wish mine did too; it would make policy a lot easier to manage. As far as health insurance and other similar benefits where family status makes a difference are concerned, I’m aware that domestic-partner recognition and eligibility vary by state and that many “singles” are only “single” because they are legally prohibited from anything else. As far as the last statistic cited goes, it occurs to me that it’s about people who could get married but may be choosing not to. And that choice is their right – insurance coverage ideally wouldn’t be a factor in that decision. At the same time, many legal rights and privileges in this country still favor the married, and it’s not unreasonable to expect that employee benefits would follow that lead.
HR professional Deb Owen at 8 hours & a lunch looks at the same article from two other sides – the single-employee’s side, and the HR/employer’s side. (emphasis added)
i’m single. i’m single and i have no children. and i work in HR. and let me tell you, sometimes it just burns me up how many people get away with using the kids as an easy excuse to get out of work. and it happens. believe me, it happens. how do i know it happens? because not all the parents require all that much time off. it’s strange how some parents seem to be able to make arrangements when their child is sick, or schedule parent/teacher conferences for before or after work. but some parents? they’ve got to be out every other week…
shouldn’t the point here be to value an employee’s work/life balance? we know that an employee who has a healthy life outside of work is a better employee at the office. so how is your time off structured? and what allowances you do make, if any, for going outside of those guidelines? can an employee take off, without hassle, for a parent/teacher conference? can another employee, a single employee, take off to a meeting of a charity event they’re working on? without hassle? or do you become the official judge and jury of what is “worthy” of your employees time?
…and by the way, single people may not have children but they have families too. and as the workforce ages, you’ll be having to make more and more allowances for us to take care of our aging parents. are you prepared for that?
I know I’ve worked with some of the people that Deb’s talking about in that first paragraph – the ones who seem to use their kids as an “excuse to get out of work.” If you’re trying to be a balance-friendly workplace, it’s not easy to challenge this, but it does get abused (even with that flexible PTO plan – the work still has to get done by someone, doesn’t it?) . And those who abuse it are not only being unfair to their childless co-workers, they’re really making it hard on the other working parents, who may feel they have to go in the opposite direction just so one person doesn’t ruin it for everyone.
Can a workplace be “too family-friendly?” I don’t think I’ve encountered one that is, but I think there are some important ideas here about not marginalizing some workers in an attempt to accommodate others – there are definitely fairness questions. Good questions, and a good reminder that working parents don’t have the market cornered on the whole juggle/balance thing.
