Corporate Work-Life Initiatives

A recent article by Jeff Stimpson entitled, "The New Equilibrium: Work-Life Balance" brought to my attention some innovative policies that companies have put in place to help employees deal with the issue of work-life balance. Policies such as:

• Flexible work hours such as offering longer work days resulting in shorter work weeks (4 day work weeks)


• Allow employees to come in later and stay longer (adjusting schedule to school and daycare hours)


• Three days of paid funeral leave, generous paid time-off, and the ability to work offsite


• Offering Blackberries with combined cell phone service to anyone who requests them enabling instantaneous call forwarding and message retrieval providing the ability for off-site work to be completed from anywhere with Internet access


• Offering part-time hours for employees and/or work-sharing


• On-site babysitting/childcare


• Three to six months of parental leave after childbirth – (yes, this goes for Father's too)


• Providing childcare on Saturdays during busy season and allowing employees the option to take time off (comp. time) instead of being paid overtime

If your organization does not have policies or programs in place to assist with the growing work-life balance issue, take the opportunity to bring up the issue with your boss or place a note in the suggestion box. Organizations that have work-life balance programs are finding that recruitment and employee retention increases thus offsetting the potential cost. It also makes sense that employees would be more focused and productive.