Last week at the Metro Atlanta Chamber, dozens of business leaders gathered for a Leadership Forum hosted by GEEARS, the Georgia Chamber Foundation, Metro Atlanta Chamber, and Athens Area Chamber of Commerce. The topic of the day: How to Attract and Retain Top Talent through Family-Friendly Policies and HR Best Practices.
One of the speakers, National Director of Best Place for Working Parents® (BP4WP), Sadie Funk, told a heart-tugging story that encapsulated exactly why we were all there. She described a small restaurant chain whose employees, many of them single mothers, shared their biggest stressor with their employer: The hardest part of my day is getting food on the table at night.
“So, what they did,” Funk explained, “is they implemented free family meals twice a week. So, now, when you’re off your shift, you get to really connect with your child versus messing around in the kitchen.”
Funk co-founded BP4WP in 2019 because more employers want to make life more livable for their employees. In fact, family-friendly policies are a must-have for organizations aiming to hire and retain employees and boost productivity and profits. BP4WP research has found, for instance, that. . .
- 83% of millennials will leave one job for another with strong family policies and supports.
- Employers report that paid family leave either maintained or increased employee productivity (89%), profitability/performance (91%), turnover (96%), and employee morale (99%).
- Lactation benefits boost post-maternity retention by 40%.
This is why GEEARS teamed up last year with the Georgia Chamber Foundation to launch Best Place for Working Parents®-Georgia, a designation achieved through a three-minute online self-assessment that signals commitment to employees’ families, their work/life balance, and their health and happiness.
It’s also why dozens of experts and employers attended last week’s Leadership Forum to engage in its data-packed presentations, inspiring stories, and an award celebrating a local employer’s approach to child care supports.
Even before these presentations began, a group of business leaders chatting over lunch already understood the quantifiable connection between family-friendly policies and productive, profitable workplaces.
“I tell my team all the time, ‘I want you to feel empowered to be your best self at home and your best self at work,’” one observed while her tablemates nodded in agreement. “Because you can’t be your best self at work if you’re not feeling like you’re a great partner, parent, sister, sometimes child, right?”
The Forum cheered both the impact of small gestures—like an architecture firm’s $400 lactation room that led to a 35% increase in retention rates—and larger investments, like paid parental leave policies and child care supports.
Speaker Brittany Scott, the Senior Manager for Policy for Early Childhood Education at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, homed in on the issue of child care as both a workforce essential and a daunting hurdle for employers.
“One of the most significant and solvable barriers to a thriving workforce is access to high-quality, affordable childcare,” she said.
But she also offered employers recommendations and solutions, stressing that businesses can help their employees without becoming child care operators by utilizing resources such as. . .
- An Enhanced Employer-Provided Child Care Credit from the federal government
- Georgia’s HB 136 Child Care Tax Program
- The Employer Child Care Navigator
All the speakers stated, often, the theme of the day: Family-friendly is business-friendly.
It’s also art-friendly, which is why the forum organizers honored Alliance Theatre with the inaugural Best Place for Working Parents®-Georgia Innovator Award. The Theatre’s Artist Childcare Program ensures that performing artists’ young children are cared for at no cost, in a creative, nurturing environment during rehearsals, performances, and other odd working hours.
Accepting the award, Olivia Aston Bosworth, the Dan Reardon Director of Youth and Families at Alliance Theatre, acknowledged that her own two children provided the first spark that led to the Artist Childcare Program, which has since become a model for arts organizations all over the country.
“Too often, parents are forced to choose between growing a family and growing a career,” she said. “As a result of our free on-site artist child care program, local arts workers are returning to work. They’re returning, pushing a stroller, and crying tears of joy for returning to the building that they love, to do the work that they love. Artists from across the country are flocking to Atlanta for the chance to work at the Alliance Theatre because we support and we celebrate the fullness of their lives.
“This recognition affirms a simple truth,” she continued. “When you invest in families, you strengthen your workforce and you strengthen your community.”
The Theatre’s recognition also highlighted the range of what family-friendly policies look like and that implementing them is possible for businesses of every size.
With so many inspiring examples, the Leadership Forum showed that no family-friendly practice is too small to reap a significant return on investment—and that big family-friendly practices are not as daunting as you’d think, especially when employers utilize public-private partnerships, tax incentives, and community-led ideation.
The event was also an opportunity to spread the word further about Best Place for Working Parents®-Georgia. (Several of the attendees filled out assessments before the forum even ended!) We invite you to also seize this opportunity to celebrate your organization’s family-friendly policies—and learn about ways to add to them. Access the assessment here and encourage your organization’s leadership or HR team to fill it out.
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