Last year, COVID-19 brought about changes that few would have ever predicted. With schools, preschools, and daycares across the country closed, working parents were forced to make quick decisions about their children and their careers. Organizations, too, were faced with little time to make impactful decisions regarding their workforces. A year and a half later, a new report finds that women and working parents, more than any other group, have had their employment affected by COVID-19.
Now, as summer’s end approaches and students are returning to school, women, men and other caretakers are preparing to return to the workforce. In this “Returning to the Workforce” series we’ll examine the impact the pandemic has had on parents and caretakers, how company policies have shifted in this new environment, and how to recruit, retain, and support parents ready to re-enter the workplace.
We’ll cover topics including why you should be hiring working parents, how to help women return to the workforce, and discuss the often-overlooked fathers in the workplace.
In our first installment, we’ll discuss how to help women return to the office. Since 2015, data shows men leaving the workforce at higher rates than women, but COVID-19 sharply reversed that trend. Now that school is returning to normal in-person sessions, we expect those women will be returning to the labor market.
We encourage you to follow along and find out how you can successfully attract parents returning to the workforce, create policies dedicated to increasing retention rates among existing employees, and further attract a more diverse workforce overall.
