Help Mothers to Stay in the Workplace and Reach Their Potential

0
If we want women to thrive in the workplace, we must address challenges holding them back. One barrier is the domestic and childcare responsibilities women face at home. Organizations have the opportunity to address this. The solution, introduce the Fair Play method. Create opportunity for mothers to stay in the workplace and reach their full potential.
 

Create Opportunity for Mothers to Stay in the Workplace and Reach Their Full Potential

Working mothers are resilient and have statistically shown higher levels of ambition at work than women overall. They know the importance of prioritization. They are determined to work smarter so they can accomplish the endless to-do list that circulates through their head at all times.
 
Since the start of the pandemic we’ve seen women are unable to juggle it all and they shouldn’t have to. McKinsey’s 2020 Women in the Workplace report, conducted with LeanIn.Org, revealed:

One in four working women in North America said that they were considering downshifting their careers or dropping out of the workforce entirely. For working mothers, and particularly those with young children, the number was one in three.

 
Why is one group of our population facing this dilemma vs. other demographics? The data points to the gendered burden of housework and caregiving, which falls on women. Mothers are more than three times as likely as fathers to be responsible for most of the housework and caregiving since the pandemic started. Women are 1.5 times more likely than fathers to spend an additional three plus hours per day on housework and childcare. Single mothers have faced even greater loads. 10 percent more single mothers report spending an additional three or more hours per day on housework and childcare.

Every person has the same 24 hours in a day. Mothers are being asked to do so much more during that time.

 
How do we help them? Every organization should be introducing their employees to the Fair Play Method.
 
Would any of us apply to a new job if it didn’t have a job description that outlined clear roles, expectations, responsibilities and requirements? No, but we navigate our house holds without these things every day.  Fair Play solves this, it’s a household system that offers couples a reimagined way to divvy up domestic responsibilities. The method’s inventor, Eve Rodsky created the system out of despair. She realized she was taking on the majority of the domestic/unpaid labor in her home. Furthermore, her identity, career marriage and life were falling apart.
 
Rodsky set out on a mission to create a system that addresses this issue. The Fair Play method includes four easy-to-follow rules, 100 household tasks, and a figurative card game you play with your partner. Fair Play helps each family prioritize what’s important to them.  To learn more check out the article, How to Split Household Tasks More Fairly Using Fair Play. 

You might be wondering, why should organizations care about this?

  • Increase retention of female talent. When women have less on their plate at home, they can show up in a more attentive way at work. Create a better environment for mothers to stay in the workplace and reach their full potential.
  • Increase leadership opportunity for female talent and address the broken rung. Men end up holding 62% of manager-level positions, compared to women hold just 38%. A big reason for this is women leaving the workforce to have children. According to LeanIn , If we fix the broken rung, we will add one million more women to management in corporate America over the next five years. If we don’t, we may never reach gender equality in leadership. More recent data shows that among employees who switched jobs in the past two years, 48% of women leaders say they did so because they wanted more opportunity to advance.
  • Increase employee satisfaction. Fair Play at home, creates higher levels of employee motivation satisfaction and productivity. It decrease levels of stress, anxiety and burnout at work.
  • Decrease maternal bias and microagressions. Introducing everyone in the organization to the burdens women in our country face regarding domestic and childcare responsibilities will create awareness and empathy. 
  • Create a diverse, equitable and inclusive company culture. 73% of all employees have some type of current caregiving responsibility. Provide solutions and options that include all identities. 
  • Create Compassionate Leaders. Equip leaders with tools to support their teams as whole humans. 

If you’re a leader, there’s a huge opportunity to bring a Fair Play workshop to your team. If you’re an individual contributor, share this article with your leadership team.

Encourage them to equip you with the tools you and the other women inside of your organization need to thrive. For more information regarding workshops visit InfiniDEI’s website and click contact us. InfiniDEI partners with entire organizations, ERG/Infinity groups or specific departments or teams.