Employer sponsored child care works to support organisations by helping to solve the significant obstacles employees face when it comes to finding and securing high quality child care when and where they want it.

By taking a proactive approach to helping employees solve their child care problems employers can eliminate a significant source of worry and distraction and will benefit from more engaged and productive employees with higher staff retention rates.

Horizons Workforce Consulting has just conducted a survey of 3100 parents from 200 organisations across the USA which offer employer sponsored child care in some form or another. Data collected from The Lasting Impact of Employer Sponsored Child Care Centres survey provides compelling evidence for a thorough investigation of the viability of introducing some form of employer subsidised or sponsored child care in your workplace.

Productivity:

• 95 per cent of respondents said that employer sponsored child care are able to better concentrate on their job.
• 93 per cent of respondents said that employer sponsored child care makes them better prepared to meet job expectations’.
• 87 per cent of respondents said that employer sponsored child care was important in enhancing their productivity.
• 79 per cent of respondents said that employer sponsored child care was important in their decision to return to work after the birth or adoption of their child.

Recruitment:

• 84 per cent of respondents who had children when they started at their organisation said employer sponsored child care was an important factor in their decision to join the company.
• More than 50 per cent of respondents who did not have children when they started in their organisation said the availability of child care was important in their decision to join the company.
• 96 per cent of respondents said they would be likely to recommend their employer to other working parents.

Retention:

• 92 per cent of respondents said that employer sponsored child care would be important in considering a change of job.
• 90 per cent of respondents said that employer sponsored child care makes them more likely to continue working for their organisation.
• 88 per cent of respondents said that employer sponsored child care was important in their decision to return to work after the birth or adoption of their child.

Well being and stress:

• 95 per cent of respondents said employer sponsored child care positively impacts their ability to balance their work and family responsibilities.
• 92 per cent of respondents said that it positively impacts their overall well being.
• 91 per cent said employer sponsored child care helps them manage their stress levels.

Job satisfaction and engagement:

• 95 per cent of respondents said employer sponsored child care provides them with added flexibility at work.
• 85 per cent said employer sponsored child care was important to their job satisfaction.
• 76 per cent of respondents ranked employer sponsored child care as the best or among the best employer benefit at their workplace.

To read The Lasting Impact of Employer Sponsored Child Care Centres click here.

The facts certainly speak for themselves and provide strong evidence for introducing some form of child care assistance in your organisation. The good news is that this doesn’t necessarily mean the construction of an in-house child care centre. Helping employees with child care benefits all organisations and while large organisations may have the resources to operate their own service, for small and medium sized organisations there are plenty of alternative options, indeed a one size fits all approach may not be appropriate.

If on-site child care is out of the question but there is still a large enough workforce and high enough demand to warrant it employers might consider leasing an existing child care centre which is close to the place of work. This ensures exclusive access to the service by company employees and avoids all the set up costs associated with building from scratch.

Similarly, employers could investigate the possibility of partnering with a local child care provider to secure a certain number of spots for company employees and ensuring priority access to those spots.

There is also the option of using a child care referral service such as Care Corporate’s child care program  to make it easier for employees to identify and secure child care in their local area.

Another way employers can support employees is through the provision of back up care in times when an employee’s usual child care arrangements fall through due to illness or another unforeseen emergency. Referral services which provide access to vetted and approved nannies and babysitters who can care for children in their own home are especially useful.

For information about how any of these types of employer sponsored child care could work in your organisation contact us.

 This Better Workplace Bulletin was First Published in October 2013