revise paper
Childcare at Workplace
At Work Childcare
Summary
Dear Workforce What Strategies Can We Use To Offer Childcare.
Joyce Blais
http://www.workforce.com/2001/06/17/dear-workforce-what-strategies-can-we-use-to-offer-childcare/
Situations occur where female employees are working shifts at odd hours and they can not find anyone to take care of their children. Companies whose hours are late such as 4:30pm to 11:30pm don’t find it to be a good idea to have children on the property that late. Even if you can find childcare that late it will probably not be the best quality or the children would rather be at home.
The first step to finding if there is non-traditional hours available for childcare is to call the local Child Care Board to figure out the rules, and if not allowed you can petition the board for a variance.
Factors to consider before establishing an on-site childcare system would be: current childcare arrangements used, are their enough children to financially support a daycare, and amount of money parents able and willing to pay.
Other options: partnering with a nearby childcare center in another workplace, there are consultants in resource and referral organizations who can search for childcare options, start a network of family care providers who can for sure provide odd-hour care because it gives them training, and look for local childcare providers who can be back-up care if needed in an emergency.
Babies at Work: Will onsite Childcare Become Standard in Offices?
By Matthew Jenkin
http://msue.anr.msu.edu/news/child_care_in_the_workplace
The Yahoo chief executive Marissa Mayer banned remote working, this upset employees because it use to allow them to work and raise a family. Mrs. Mayer thought it would be productive to have all employees working in same building, but she did not empathize with working parents because she had a personal nursery in her office.
In 2003 Goldman Sachs opened an on-site daycare for employees, and offered 20 days free. In 2010 they added four weeks for free to help transitioning parents after maternity leave. The stress of worrying about a nanny caring for your child is gone and the employee can focus on work but also check up on their child at anytime.
Carla Moquin, the founder of the US-based Parenting in the Workplace Institute says that flexibility through work and life balance are important because an employee is going to be more willing to work for a company if that company is supportive of family. It is really expensive to replace staff if they quit especially if it is due to lack of support for family. Not a lot of business can afford to offer this benefit. Businesses like London’s Goldsmiths College and Royal Mail’s Mount Pleasant might have to foreclose because the cost to run is costing tens of thousands of dollars and it only benefits a few employees.
Around 200 companies in the United States have policies in place allowing “babies at work.” In 2012, the UK taxi firm Addison Lee decided to try out this idea. Clare Bishop, head of HR, said that there is an initial decrease in productivity, but in the long run there will be an increase in in staff retention and loyalty. Ways to make this form of workplace efficient would be to have parents respond quickly to the child’s needs, create a “baby free zone” for employees who do not want to be disturbed, designating co-workers who are willing to assist with other staff members children, and the parents must agree that their childcare will not disturb their work.
Moquin says the biggest barrier for businesses not supporting childcare is culture. She says “… our biggest hurdle is education- giving these companies the information and ideally convincing them that it works for enough different job types and organizations, and has enough benefits for both the employee and employer…” gNappies European head, Louise Roper says that their on site nursery is ideal for staff with employees but it does not assist with older children. She offered parents with older children the ability to work remotely. They saw an opportunity to support parents by giving them more freedom to care for their child and found that everyone was much happier and did their work on time.
The Advantages and Disadvantages to Offering Child Care at the Parent’s Place of Work. Tracy Trautner.
https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2016/jan/13/babies-at-work-onsite-childcare-office-goldman-sachs-addison-lee
Facebook announced they were adding a mulit-million dollar expansion, which would include bar, bike shop, housing, salon, and dog day care, but they are not adding child care. 7% of companies offer day care to employees. Google opened two day care centers holding 200 children which created an intriguing recruiting device, due to being so popular they are adding a third care center. When employees have daycare at their office they work harder, stay loyal to their job, miss fewer days, and brag about their job. A study published in the Journal of Managerial Psychology discovered performance increase and absenteeism decreased in employees using on-site care vs. employees using other childcare. The most important part of a company is their people who push the company forward with their innovation and creativity. The care center retains employees as well as recruits future employees. In 2015 34.4 million families in the US had children under 18, 60.6% of families have both parents working.
Advantages: Improves productivity, 90% of parents using full time on-site day cares had advanced concentration and productivity. Helps keep and attract future employees, 23% of parents declined a job change or changed jobs due to the on-site daycare that they had, and 90% of new parents said that on-site child care was a reason they came back to work. Convenient and creates good morale, it shows the employee that they are appreciated. And offers emotional security, the parent can visit child throughout the day. Disadvantages are the high cost, furniture, insurance, staffing, and materials. Liability, if something happens to the child the company can be liable. Distracted parents, if a parent check in on child too often it can decrease their work and makes it harder for child to make new relationships.
Synthesized Reflection
Childcare in the workplace should be a very important part of a business to benefit their employees. First you need to figure out if on-site day care is possible, how it is possible, and then the advantages and disadvantages.
There are many companies that have non-traditional hours and they find themselves in a dilemma because they do not know how to care for their children. There are a few options that companies can do to start the process of finding childcare for their employees, the first is to call the local Child Care Board to figure out the rules, and if not allowed you can petition the board for a variance. The business then needs to figure out if there are enough children and parents willing to pay enough money to support a daycare. Then you can also start a network of family care providers who can for sure provide odd-hour care because it gives them training, and look for local childcare providers who can be back-up care if needed in an emergency (Blais). If an on-site daycare is not possible a company could try a policy allowing babies at work. The US has around 200 companies have policies in place allowing “babies at work.” In 2012, the UK taxi firm Addison Lee decided to try out this idea. Clare Bishop, head of HR, said that there is an initial decrease in productivity, but in the long run there will be an increase in in staff retention and loyalty. Ways to make this form of workplace efficient would be to have parents respond quickly to the child’s needs, create a “baby free zone” for employees who do not want to be disturbed, designating co-workers who are willing to assist with other staff members children, and the parents must agree that their childcare will not disturb their work (Jenkin).
There are several advantages to having on-site childcare facilities. It is statistically proven that 90% of employees using on-site childcare had advanced improvement in productivity and also those parents found this opportunity as a reason to come back to work (Traunter). Other advantages include retaining future employees, creates good morale, convenient, and provides emotional security.
There are disadvantages of having daycares run by the company. One is the problem with cost. Monquin says that a barrier for a business not supporting childcare is culture. Employees need to convince companies that it will be beneficial for both the employee and employer (Jenkin). One example is the Yahoo chief executive not having empathy for employees needing to be onsite for work and not being able to work remotely to care for their child at home. She also had a personal nursery in her office to care for her child.
The Yahoo chief executive Marissa Mayer banned remote working, this upset employees because it use to allow them to work and raise a family. Mrs. Mayer thought it would be productive to have all employees working in same building, but she did not empathize with working parents because she had a personal nursery in her office and did not have to struggle to balance work and family like they did (Jenkin). Other disadvantages would be the high cost of operating a full service daycare, liability that could effect the company, and a distracted parent (Trautner).
In the end, it is clear that onsite daycare would have more benefits than drawbacks for both the employee and their business. It should be a necessity in a company if they can afford to support a full time daycare. It is the right thing to do and in the end the employees will be happier which will lead to better workers and workers that will stay with the company longer and help it grow.