Arguments for company to implement a good maternity/parental leave policy

[dkinlondon]

I will be having a discussion and possibly negotiation with our company CEO on Monday to present my arguments as to why the company should offer women additional maternity leave (i.e. not just the statutory). I have a feeling the CEO is unlikely to give any, so I'm working on some strong arguments as to why he needs to reconsider that.

Does anyone have any experience and good advice on how to approach such a discussion?

I'm planning on referring to the company values (which are all about support, helping each other etc.). I have a few stats showing that most companies offer more than the minimum requirements. But if anyone's been through this before, or knows or any good resources, I would be really grateful to hear them! Thanks.

You may want to also cover areas such as; how many employees may this impact (current and future projections), will it be seen via employee engagement, will you also look at pat leave options? Are there any official stats around employee retention? Just off the top of my head if I was challenging a business case...

Best of luck, a very worthwhile reason!

If there is any form of skill in the work, or any training needed, or any shortage of suitable people then enhanced benefits of all sorts attracts and keeps good workers. This kind of thing engenders good feelings and encourages workers to 'go that extra mile' when needed because they know their employer is a good sort who has their backs.

Main argument is that a positive attitude promotes retention of returners reducing cost of recruitment and training, improving continuity of business and staff turnover.

What do your competitors offer? Unfortunately most employers are reducing rather than increasing additional benefits.

Diversity, it'll be difficult to find talent if you exclude potentially half of workforce

Great advice so far. Thanks everyone. Currently only getting the 6 weeks + statutory, and with this being an international company (yet very small UK office), I will also argue that I am worse off than employees in pretty much all their other offices (US employees being the only exception).

As much as possible I will try and frame it in terms of how it will also be in their interest to offer more

What is the industry like? Best approach for this is to usually get a job offer with a competitor and then detail the ins and outs of their maternity / family policies.

There’s a mumsnet campaign about this at the moment, might be useful info for you- www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_campaigns/3695505-MNHQ-here-with-a-request

As much as possible I will try and frame it in terms of how it will also be in their interest to offer more

You need to do more than just show how it will "also" be in their interests.

You have to put the benefits for the company front and centre in your business case, otherwise it will get kicked into the long grass.

Remember that they only need to do the statutory, so for them to be willing to do any more than they have to, it must be framed in terms of benefits to the company (attracting talent, increasing diversity, reduction in longer term recruitment costs due to a more stable workforce, mitigating loss of knowledge and specialist skills from the organisation etc).