Dive Brief:
- Employers have been in the news lately for expanding leave for people having children -- in some cases offering five months of paid leave or more, according to an article at HREonline.
- From the employee’s perspective, expanded parental leave seems like a beautiful thing, Cappelli writes. But he wonders if it's possible these programs can actually work as planned, even with the best of intentions by the employers.
- These programs are aimed at recruiting women, writes Peter Cappelli, director of the Center for Human Resources at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. But often, there is little incentive to take the time off.
Dive Insight:
Cappelli writes that given the way many companies operate, with unbelievable demands on managers and executives who are on-call 24 hours a day and constantly fighting fires, it is very hard to see how anyone who really cares about his or her career could step out of it for any length of time and expect to come back.
Companies don't always have to operate lean and expect their employees to absorb all the demands and stresses created by business, he says. Operating that way pretty much squashes any incentive to actually take any leave time. But, unfortunately, companies often can't afford to work any other way.
In any case, it's an interesting perspective on an issue that's been gathering steam.
