Ensuring that working parents are supported during the summer months when their children don’t spend their days at school can be a welcome consideration for many. Not only is it a great way to build engagement, but also a path towards building a community within the workforce.
When school is out for the summer and endless days of freedom await students, employees aren’t quite at liberty to enjoy the sunny skies the same way. The summer months can find parents more stressed than ever, combating additional childcare challenges that their jobs don’t pause to accommodate.
Between finding additional ways to ensure their children are cared for and fighting the urge to sneak in a vacation while their children are already on break, employees often find themselves more occupied than ever, navigating problems that continue to pile up. Addressing childcare challenges via employee benefits is one way for employers to showcase a genuine interest in their workforce, easing the burden of responsibility to help them better focus on the job.
The summer months may be about sunny skies and lazy beach days for some, but for working parents, there is more planning and stress that awaits. There are many ways that employers can make things easier for their employees. (Image: Pexels)
How Can You Support Working Parents This Summer? A Quick Guide for Employers
Employees are a vital part of any organization, despite ongoing efforts to reduce the reliance on human labor. Much of their daily lives centers around their jobs and what they do within their offices day-to-day, but they also manage an entire life outside of the workplace that demands their attention. Employers that acknowledge this basic duality are the ones who best benefit from the entirety of the dedication and effort of their workforce, but this trust must be earned.
For working parents, the summer months can be particularly difficult as their children are freed from school and are at home all day. Ensuring there is someone to care for them, provide them with meals, and keep them gainfully occupied can be difficult. Most try to make arrangements on their own to cover these aspects, but they also remain concerned for their kids for most of their workdays.
This increased distraction doesn’t benefit them or their work, but it isn’t something they can just turn off with the flip of a switch. Many workers also see their expenses go up during this period, adding additional financial concerns to their plates.
Creating solutions for everyday problems that thousands of employees encounter every day doesn’t just benefit employees, but sparks a cultural movement centered around united problem-solving. If employers want a fully focused workforce, they may benefit from creating the right conditions to make it possible. Part of that requirement can mean supporting working parents, especially during the summer. How can they do it? Here are a few examples.
1. Summer Fridays and Flexible Workplace Policies
Hot summer days drain everyone of their will to work, regardless of whether they have children or not. Summer Fridays are a great way to give employees an additional day or a half-day off on Fridays for a few weeks during the summer months. This allows them to spend more time with their children or simply time on their own enjoyment in making the most of summer. It offers the business an opportunity to test out a four-day workweek, a shift that many employees would be glad to see as the permanent mode of operations eventually.
Flexible scheduling, in general, can be a very useful way to support employees with childcare during the summer months. This can look like allowing employees to come in later, go home earlier, or simply work from home more often for a few weeks.
2. Access to Daycare Solutions
Childcare centers can be exorbitantly expensive, particularly in big cities where there is considerable competition to access these centers. Daycare assistance is one of the best childcare benefits companies can provide all year round, but it is especially beneficial during the summer months. Employers can either provide on-site daycare or collaborate with a daycare center nearby to help employees leave their children somewhere they will be supervised all day.
3. Summer Camps and Other Skill-Building Programs
Many working parents try to find a summer camp for their children to attend during the summer months, but these can also be very expensive. Some of the residential options make it easy for kids to stay with others their age and pick up some key skills along the way, but others operate for a few hours a day before sending the kids home. Regardless of the format, these camps are very useful in the development of children and in keeping their minds active during their school break.
When employer-supported summer camps are available, employees can spend less time stressing over identifying such camps months in advance or setting up multiple strategies to access them. Employers who can make such arrangements can help their employees access such resources for their children for cheaper, allowing them to be at ease about their child’s well-being and ongoing development.
4. Encourage PTO Usage and Provide Travel Benefits
Parenting isn’t just about finding somewhere to stow the kids away until schools reopen. Employees would also likely love to make the most of their free time to bond with their children, take them to see their grandparents, or go on vacation. Unfortunately, most hesitate to use their PTO policies as intended, for fear of negative reactions from their employers. Creating a generous PTO policy isn’t enough, as employers also need to create a culture where taking occasional breaks from work isn’t seen as a flaw or a sign of poor dedication to their work.
Encouraging PTO usage and offering additional travel benefits can help both working parents and childfree employees make the most of the sun and get some time away from work to enjoy the lives they work so hard to build. It is also important to create systems to balance out the leave requests so all the employees get a shot at enjoying a break without leaving the business understaffed. Such considerations are what make it easier for employees to take some paid time off from work.
5. Educate Employees on Existing Programs that they Might Benefit From
Employers can provide solutions to the summer stress that parents experience themselves and ease some of the burdens they are juggling, but that isn’t the only form of support. Many other organizations may be willing to lend a hand, or employees could seek out government-assisted programs that they may not be aware of.
The Dependent Care Assistance Program (DCAP) allows employees to use “tax-free dollars to pay for child day care or elder day care expenses” that working employees might incur when both parents are gainfully employed. Filing dependency exemptions for parents of young children can be very beneficial in affording daycare solutions or similar programs.
Very often, employees aren’t fully aware of the benefits provided by their own employers. Creating awareness around the available employee benefits that address various childcare challenges can be a good place to start.
Childcare Benefits to Support Working Parents Can Be Innovative and Tailored to the Organization
Most of the strategies listed here to support working parents during the summer are common practices that many organizations offer. The perfect strategies and employee benefits at your organization can look different. Discounts and subsidies on groceries and school supplies, employee resource groups for working parents, school supply swaps for the upcoming year, mental health resources for exhausted parents, and scholarships or internships for the children of employees are just some of the benefits that employers can also provide to their workforce.
Organizations that work closely with educational institutions can help employees with access to information about the best programs for their children for education planning. Businesses that work in the travel industry can help with free air travel or access to affordable accommodations for employees and their children. Those who work in media can help encourage employees to bring their children into work on occasion, to get a behind-the-scenes look at how everything works.
Employees facing summer childcare challenges aren’t just worried about caregiving duties, but also about making the most of the summer with their children. Employers are free to get creative with how they help their employees out and facilitate a bonding experience with them and the families who fuel them with the desire to do their best at work.
What are your best recommendations for employers hoping to support working parents during the summer? Share them with us. Subscribe to The HR Digest for more insights on workplace trends, layoffs, and what to expect with the advent of AI.
