January 16, 2009 .
The Workplace Flexibility 2010 News Roundup is a compilation of the latest news articles, reports and other materials related to workplace flexibility. The News Roundup appears twice-weekly. If you have questions about any of the items, please contact WF2010@law.georgetown.edu.
Articles
The policy potential of a mom-in-chief
“But (hope alert!) there is also the possibility that the fourth F - the family - will turn into a serious agenda that cements a bond between the woman in the White House and the women in Every House. Michelle Obama wisely listed her first priority as seeing her daughters through the transition. But as she told "60 Minutes," "Women are capable of doing more than one thing well at the same time." Indeed, Obama presented herself as a woman who's "had to juggle being mom-in-chief and having a career for a long time." If, as she routinely said during the campaign, it's a struggle for her - a woman with resources and a grandma-in-chief - imagine how much harder it must be for others.”
Firms, GCs to Develop a 'Best Practices' List for Diversity, Work-Life Balance
“Lack of diversity and work-life balance are often treated as two separate problems in the legal profession, but a new initiative headed by the Project for Attorney Retention is seeking to find solutions that address both. The Diversity and Flexibility Connection initiative will bring together managing partners from firms with good track records on work-life issues with a dozen general counsel from major U.S. companies, including the Coca-Cola Co. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Over the course of two meetings, the group will develop a list of best practices to promote both diversity and work-life among attorneys, said PAR co-director Joan C. Williams. It will also develop a metrics system to weigh how effective those practices are.”
Your Mother Is Moving In? That's Great
“Like the Obamas’ new domestic arrangement, whereby Marian Robinson, Michelle Obama’s 71-year-old mother, will become a third head of household and the primary caregiver for two children born to two high-achieving parents, the linchpin of the Baker-Roby household is a grandmother. Theirs is an old-fashioned scenario that fell out of style as Americans drifted to the hermetically sealed nuclear family. Since the early part of the last century, academics have noted the waning of this arrangement in the United States, because of increased mobility, smaller families and even Freudian attitudes, rampant at midcentury, that described “too close” adult maternal ties as unhealthy. It is a choice, however, that is cycling back into favor. A recent study by AARP shows that multigenerational households are on the rise, up from 5 million in 2000 to 6.2 million last year, an increase from 4.8 percent of all households to 5.3 percent. It’s not always a smooth ride — families being what they are — but it’s still an appealing solution to the work-life conundrum.”
Forum to discuss when work works
“Local Savannah businesses and agencies will discuss workplace policies to respond to the needs of low-wage workers. Step Up is Savannah's poverty reduction initiative. Dale Carlson-Bebout, Step Up's director of supporting work project, said the forum will provide local input that Workplace Flexibility 2010 can translate into national policy to help balance business needs with low-income employees [ . . .] The conversation is intended to identify strategies that help employees and employers eliminate barriers to getting to work on time and reducing absenteeism as well as help low-wage workers to meet their family and community obligations.”
Judge rules 9to5 can join lawsuit over sick leave ordinance
“The organization that led the effort to require Milwaukee employers to offer paid sick leave can join the city in defending the new ordinance against a challenge from the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, a judge ruled Wednesday. Milwaukee County Circuit Judge John DiMotto found that 9to5, the National Association of Working Women Milwaukee chapter can join the city in the suit because of the role it played in drafting the ordinance and spearheading the petition drive that collected more than 40,000 signatures and put the measure on the ballot in the Nov. 4 election. The measure passed with 69% of the vote.”
Easing the pain of re-entry
“These three women hardly sound like they would fear re-entering the job market […] Yet despite their proven abilities and accomplishments, Nash, Wallace and Curry all sought outside guidance and support — through the UC Hastings School of Law’s Opting Back In Program — when they decided to resume their legal careers after taking time off from the fast track to have more time for their children. [. . .] The Opting Back In program was started in fall 2006 as a four- or eight-week coaching, networking and educational program on the UC Hastings campus in San Francisco. For the last year, it has taken the form of a twice-a-week, conference-call workshop with Linda Marks, director of training and consulting at the Center for WorkLife Law at Hastings, and Ellen Ostrow, a Maryland-based licensed psychologist, certified coach and law firm consultant, and up to 10 lawyers who took time out from their careers. They have mostly been women who wanted more time at home with their children.”
Blogs
Gannett's Unpaid Furlough: No Work Emails While On Leave
“In the latest dramatic move in the woe-beset media business, big newspaper publisher Gannett announced yesterday that it would impose mandatory one-week unpaid furloughs on most of its thousands of employees during the first quarter. The company says the action is meant to avoid layoffs, but many of those employees will find it hard to get by with a loss of a week’s salary. Still, there may be something of a silver lining: stringent no-work rules that come with the furlough. According to the New York Times, Gannett told employees that federal and state labor laws require employees on an unpaid furlough to refrain from anything related at all to work, including ‘reading or responding to emails, calling or responding to calls from colleagues.’”
Actually, Millenials Do Expect Work Flexibility - Reinterpreting PWC's Survey
“The summary of findings concludes that, ‘Although the millennials seem to indicate flexibility is not expected, we did however receive many comments about wanting more flexibility.’ What? Which is it? Something wasn’t adding up. And might organizations take these findings from the well-respected PWC as license to stop focusing on greater work+life flexibility, especially in this economic environment? The PWC researchers attributed the difference between the quantitative findings and qualitative comments to the fact that, ‘Perhaps the millennials do not feel that total flexibility is a realistic possibility, even though it is something they might desire. We also believe that their expectations may change as they get older and the need for greater flexibility for example to look after family members may become more of a priority.’”
Layoffs Demand Spousal Flexibility
“But if spouses step into their new dance and work at it for the greater good of the family, they’ll find themselves stronger as a couple and gain greater professional flexibility. For tips on re-entering the workplace and navigating a path from mommy to manager, read On-Ramping Moms. The problem is not losing your cool on a day-to-day basis and continuing to be supportive when the jobs are not out there and Cobra is taking a big bite out of your unemployment check. A new study finds that for most newly unemployed workers, keeping their family on their employer's group health coverage is beyond the reach of many, consuming 84% of the average monthly unemployment check.”
How the Obama jobs program will affect women workers
“Could it possibly be that women have lost only 20 percent of the jobs that have vanished in the last, devastating year? Elsewhere in the report, Romer and Bernstein write that while the overall unemployment rate during the current recession has risen 2.3 percentage points, the unemployment rate for women has increased only 1.6 percentage points. Math may be hard, but that figure still means the unemployment rate for women rose 70 percent as fast as the overall rate. How can that be if they bore only 20 percent of the job losses? Women comprise almost half of the American work force. The two numbers are impossible to reconcile. What's the answer? According to Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, the key is that more new women entered the market, looking for work just as, interestingly, men left the job market. He didn't say it, but I'm guessing that women are pouring into the workplace at least in part because their spouses' incomes cannot support the family anymore.”
Global News
Michelle Mone: Why Rachida Dati had to go back to work
“That was the pattern. Get up, express the milk, hand over the baby, feel upset, get on a plane, feel upset, go to business meetings, cry in the loo, put on this face because I had to appear strong and professional and a credible businesswoman. It affects your relationship with your husband because you have so many tasks to do that you've no time whatsoever; you don't want to be even in the same room as him. When I was at home and the baby was asleep I would take every opportunity to catch up on phone calls, e-mails, everything else. I got up in the night because I felt exceptionally guilty that I was away during the day, so I wanted to bond with the baby alone. When I was breast-feeding I would take pictures of her face and look at them when I was travelling. However difficult it was emotionally, it was my choice to do it; I was so far down the line with my business that I had to carry on. Arrangements for the big launch were in place and my business depended on that.”
Cool reaction to colleague's colds
“The common cold might be common but it attracts an uncommon amount of feeling. Last week in the UK the controversial topic made it onto the televised national news because the makers of Benylin cough mixture had come up with an ad in which a nice looking woman wakes up one morning with a cold. She struggles to get up, but the voice-over urges her to stay in bed and “Take A Benylin Day”. We then see her propped up in bed happily reading a book. The Federation of Small Business then lodged a complaint, saying that people should not be encouraged to stay at home with a cold. One can understand their point of view. According to the Sun newspaper (not the most reliable source, but still) 2.4m Britons threw a sickie last Monday.”