How Can HR Help Parents in the Workplace?

It’s the job of Human Resources (HR) to support employees and allow them to bring their best to the workplace. A part of this is supporting employees with children. After all, parents who are constantly worried about their child’s current situation or future won’t be able to focus on their work!

To ease parents’ minds and attract more talent to their company, HR departments should do their utmost to provide support for parents. Whether you’re an HR leader at a new startup or a new hire looking to attract new talent to an established company, these five actionable tips will help you uplift parent employees and allow them to bring their best focus to the office.

1. Offer Work From Home Options

Our first suggestion is to offer work from home or remote workplace options. This will allow parents to stay at home to help take care of their children, and promote a deeper bond between parent and child. Parents of younger children will especially appreciate this, but it could also be useful for parents who have to drop off and pick up their children during the workday.

Working from home also cuts down on commuting time, meaning that parents will have more time to spend with their child off work hours.

Now, it’s true that many companies are actually pushing return-to-office policies in an attempt to fill up empty office spaces. But this is actually a sunk cost fallacy – the building’s rent has already been paid for, so it should be written off in any future considerations. 

2. Offer Flexible Working Hours

In a similar vein, HR can allow flexible working hours for employees both in and out of the office. While a nine to five position is traditional, it certainly doesn’t account for the unique bell schedule set by each individual school. In fact, schools within the same neighborhoods tend to stagger their starting and release times to prevent too much traffic congestion. 

As such, parents could be responsible for dropping off their children anywhere from 7 am to 9 am, and picking them up anywhere from 2:30 pm to 5 pm (even without considering extracurriculars for the upper grades).

As such, HR should communicate with parents on an individual level to set a working schedule that meets their family’s needs, and be lenient with the occasional tardy clock-in from a hectic drop-off. Be sure to revisit this schedule every school year, as different levels of schools usually have different starting and dismissal times.

A hybrid work model could be a good option for employees with particularly erratic schedules, allowing them to leave the office early, pick up the kids, and continue work from home.

3. Establish Employee Assistance Programs

Employee Assistant Programs (EAPs) are work-based voluntary programs that help employees manage issues such as work-life balance, legal issues, mental health, and debt management. In this particular case, EAPs can help provide personalized resources and recommendations for employees struggling with family-related issues. For example, based on an individual employee’s budget and needs, they could create a curated list of local childcare facilities, or help them research laws related to childcare.

HR departments can either subcontract a specialized EAP company to provide these services, or hire an EAP specialist to serve on site. If your company is looking to attract and support many parents, having an EAP specialist on call may be more cost efficient in the long run.

4. Be Flexible With Nonmonetary Benefits

Compensation and benefits used to be fairly simple in the old days: the company and position that paid the most money was the clear winner. But as any parent will tell you, some memories and people are absolutely priceless. 

As such, parents may be more than willing to take a pay dock in exchange for other benefits that would support a healthier work-life balance or child support, such as more vacation days, sick days, maternity leave time, or a company car they could use for personal transportation as well. These needs will vary depending on each parent’s individual circumstances, so it’s best to hammer these out on a case-by-case basis and revisit them every half year or so.

If your company has enough employees who need it, you could also look into on-site daycare services for younger children, cutting down on employee travel time and stress.

Not sure what sort of nonmonetary benefits you could offer, or how to manage them? Check out this HR blog for more details.

5. Provide DCFSA Benefits

Finally, beyond nonmonetary benefits, HR can also provide financial aid to parents in the form of Dependent Care Flexible Spending Accounts. These are deductions made to employees’ salaries, setting aside up to $2,500 per parent specifically to pay for things such as babysitters, daycare and preschool fees, and summer camps for children under 13 years of age. 

DCFSAs aren’t subject to income tax for employees or payroll taxes for employers, making it a financial win-win for both the company and the employee.

Conclusion

If your company is hoping to attract professionals with children, HR can sweeten the pot by offering work from home options, more flexible working hours, employee assistance programs, nonmonetary benefits, and dependent care flexible spending accounts. Your working parents will surely be grateful for the help, and put their all into supporting the company that supports them.