Webinar: Supporting all parents at work

How supporting both caregivers is an important step toward gender equality

We know from our research that women face organisational, societal and personal barriers in the workplace¹. These challenges manifest in competing pressures between home and work. Almost half of working mothers feel that they have sacrificed their career for the sake of their family.

But it’s not only mothers who face competing pressures. Contemporary fathers do too.

Almost three quarters of families in the UK have both parents in employment, and despite changes in society, the majority of households still have the father working full-time and the mother working part-time².

Models of family structure are evolving yet fathers who work outside of gender norms, for example working part-time or flexibly, experience significant bias in what has been termed the ‘fatherhood forfeit’³, with negative impacts on pay and promotion opportunities.

It is crucial that organisations meet the needs of modern families and through policies, practices and cultures help enable a fairer balance between the genders, in order to maximise the potential and engagement of their talent.

In this webinar, we will be joined by three panellists:

1. Fritz von Hardenberg – CFO eBay International and father, Switzerland
2. KK Diaz – entrepreneur and father, South Africa
3. Seetal Bhatti – Director of HR, BT Global and mother, UK

We will share data on the barriers and challenges parents face in the workplace, and what this means for organisations. Our panel discussion will explore the reality of parents navigating these challenges in different contexts, and we’ll conclude with practical tips for organisations on how to best drive gender equality by supporting parents in the workplace.

Hosts

Sharon Peake – Founder & CEO, Shape Talent 

Sarah Meier – Founder & CEO, parents@work

Watch webinar here

¹ The three barriers preventing women from progressing in corporate UK today  (shapetalent.com)
² Families and the labour market, England – Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk)
³ ‘Fatherhood forfeits’ and ‘motherhood penalties’ (CIPD)