Support with caring for children and elder care will help organisations retain talent, said Charlotte Sweeney, former head of diversity and inclusion, EMEA at Nomura, speaking at Employee Benefits Live on 26 September.
The diversity, inclusion and wellbeing specialist added that people are more likely to leave work to handle care responsibilities than step away from their responsibilities and continue working.
“While I worked at Nomura, I was really focused on our benefits scheme and how we supported people with caring responsibilities because we were losing a lot of people because they didn’t know how to juggle these responsibilities with a demanding job,” said Sweeney.
While at the organisation, Sweeney was involved in the introduction of a parental transition programme to help new parents, including those who were adopting or having a child through surrogacy, return to work. She was also involved with the introduction of an employee life and family network, employee buddy system, and emergency and permanent care solutions.
Sweeney added that when looking at care support and benefits it is important to take into account the diversity of the workforce, in terms of gender, age and disability because one size does not fit all. She added that analyzing benefits with diversity in mind allows an employer to develop a package that will benefit the majority of employees.
