The school summer holiday juggle

Our Five Tips to help you support employees with families

With the summer holidays nearly upon us, those of us that have kids will be booking holiday clubs, arranging swaps with other parents, reaching out to family for help and producing an amazing spreadsheet to work it all out. And let's be honest most of the people doing it will be the mums, even if both partners work full time. 

Share the load
YouGov data shows that in many couples cleaning, cooking and child rearing is still considered a woman’s work. 38% of women who work full-time and have a partner say these tasks mostly fall on them, compared with only 9% of men in the same situation.

The evolution of hybrid working during the pandemic has helped, with more employees able to work from home, however the solution is not just to work whilst the kids occupy themselves glued to devices or pretend you don’t have kids! So how can employers do more to support their staff? 


1. Break the bias - time to let Dads step up 

Dads should be able to use holiday and additional parental leave to share the load and employers need to encourage this, sharing examples, case studies and giving options. It’s often stated that women have to work as if they don’t have children and parent like they don’t have a job - let's encourage and support Dads to step up and share the juggle. Bright horizons has some great tools and support for Dads.


2. Improve flexible working options

Employers often point those who want flexibility to the hybrid working options, but this may not be enough, especially over the summer holidays for families and carers. Can you support parents to reduce their hours over the summer holiday period, offering them the flexibility to reduce their hours or change their working patterns? 

There is currently a war on talent with employers struggling to land talent, figures show record vacancies and high quit rates: according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), there were a record 1.29 million job openings in the UK between January and March this year.

Anything you can do to help your teams during these difficult periods will help towards retaining your talent, and the more flexible you are, could help you attract more talent too. This links to Charter Goal One - The promotion and availability of flexible and part-time working.

1.5m people are trapped in low paid part-time work below their skill level and 400,000 people are out of work because they can’t find quality flexible jobs.                                 Joseph Rowntree foundation


3. Ensure Financial Wellbeing 

Recent statistics from the OECD shows that the UK has the second most expensive childcare system in the world and since 2009 prices have increased by 27%, making childcare more expensive than ever before. Add to that the cost of fuel, energy and food increasing, for some childcare just isn’t an affordable option over the summer holidays. This could really impact the mental and financial wellbeing of your teams.

Employers, what can you do to support parents and carers in lower paid roles in your organisation, so that they can continue to work and care for their families during the summer holidays? Are there different patterns of working available to them? Can you provide subsidised childcare in your workplace? Can you provide financial wellbeing support and education? CIPD has advice that could help. This supports charter goal four - encouraging and supporting female employees in lower paid and lower skilled occupations through appropriate training and other on-going support.

The cost of living crisis is causing hunger, hardship and mental anguish for too many single parent families                    Gingerbread

4. Change working patterns

Are there options for your employees to pick up work early in the morning or later in the evening, to allow time with kids in the day, can employees have ‘meeting free’ days so that they can be more available to engage with children and complete household work during the day, this works well with older kids who are more self sufficient.


5. Inclusive culture and family engagement 

Do you have an inclusive culture in your workplace? How can you engage more with your employees with children during this time, including their children by putting on events, quizzes, barbeques, and ‘bring your kids to work’ days, or family fun days, in order to develop a more family friendly culture at your workplace and engage with people outside of the traditional methods.
Recent research from McKinsey found that nearly half of the employees who voluntarily left the workforce during the pandemic aren’t coming back on their own. They say that employers must go and get them.

Post pandemic employers “must recognize how the rules of the game have changed. While workers are demanding (and receiving) higher compensation, many of them also want more flexibility, community, and an inclusive culture to accept a full-time job at a traditional employer.”         McKinsey

There are some great events happening in bristol this summer that you can get involved in, have a look at this round up of options.
Resources that can help you support your employees 

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• Working families - childcare support and employer resources
• Bright horizons - Advice for fathers and employer resources
• Gingerbread - Support for single parents
• Mind - Mental Health support - Taking care of your staff
• Free/low cost kids meals over summer holidays