As Amanda explains, the Company started the journey a few years ago to enhance its parent/carer supports to its people, realising how vital it was for their business to prioritise the needs of families, particularly women. The a2 Milk Company recognised that carer responsibilities and career are not siloed options for people. As Amanda explains: “The two should not be exclusive and we have acknowledged that we must continue to evolve our family-inclusive culture.”
The a2 Milk Company set out on this journey with Parents At Work via the Employer Membership services to help guide them in building a robust parental leave policy.
“Our partnership with Parents at Work has been critical to us as it’s given access to best practice and thought leadership as it relates to employer initiatives and benchmarks.”
Amanda Hart, Chief People & Culture Officer, The a2 Milk Company
The Company now has an impressive (not to mention industry leading) family leave policy which includes:
- A gender-neutral parental leave policy that includes 20 weeks fully paid leave with no qualifying period
- Company provided superannuation contributions for all paid and unpaid parental leave
- Up to five days of paid leave for early pregnancy loss
- Full parental leave provisions paid for any pregnancy loss after 20 weeks
- Neo-natal leave which provides four weeks of full pay in addition to the parental leave payment, if neo-natal intensive care is required
- Eight weeks of additional paid leave for the birth of multiples (twins, triplets etc.)
- Five days of paid leave for Grandparents, for the birth of a new family member (includes adoption, foster care)
The a2 Milk Company also support their people with the Parents At Work Hub which the company have customised with their brand and called it Families@a2 Hub. The Hub is an online educational platform for families designed to support them through all stages of their work life journey. The Hub provides a range of family-related resources, including webinars, podcasts, and online courses. Through the Hub all team members at The a2 Milk Company can access The Work Life Wellbeing program, a series of live webinars to support their people with career, parenting, wellbeing and support to manage work-life commitments. Topics include: Preparing for Parental Leave, Returning to Work, Managing Flexible Work for You and Your Career, The Transferable Skills of Parenting and Raising Teenagers in Today’s Digital Environment.
The Parents At Work Hub has unlocked such a diverse array of resources for all family constructs and challenges, and it’s been invaluable to our team members. In particular, team members embarking on parental leave for the first time found the resources to be of value” Amanda Hart, Chief People & Culture Officer, The a2 Milk Company
Let’s dive a little deeper to find out what other great family-inclusive initiatives The a2 Milk Company offer, and the impact these have had in this interview with their Chief People & Culture Officer, Amanda Hart . . .
Is there a particular initiative or policy that has had significant traction or impact?
In the past year we launched Women’s Health Leave to support the symptoms of peri/menopause, endometriosis and/or fertility treatments. We also invited Thea O’Connor into our business to educate all team members on menopause at work. The response to this has been fantastic and it’s ignited awareness and sentiment across our teams that the challenges experienced through peri/menopause are relevant and seen.
What challenges have you found in building a more family-inclusive culture? How did you address these?
As a multinational business, we must be mindful of the market differences and societal norms that vary and require consideration when launching new initiatives. For example, in the USA offering paid parental leave for 20 weeks is uncommon and we had to consider how commercial impacts need to be balanced with the approach. These concerns don’t change the outcome but they require sensitivity and acknowledgement of the trepidation that may arise when driving a family-inclusive culture. We also have production sites, where we need to balance the needs of running a manufacturing site whilst still supporting team members and providing a benefit that far exceeds the legislative requirements.
Do you have any measurable insights to share?
Of all employees that have utilised The a2Milk Company’s generous paid parental leave benefits, half have been men. That’s an incredible track record as far as providing equal access to gender neutral policy and leave entitlement go. When it comes to access to flexible working options The a2Milk Company have mostly informal arrangements in place with three formal requests to date.
What inspires you personally to work for a family-friendly organisation?
One of my professional motivators is when I know I can bring my authentic self to work (and I aspire to have all team members feel safe to do the same). As a working parent, I feel as though my authentic self can exist in my workplace as I don’t need to neglect any part of who I am. I can request meetings to commence later because of school drop off, or leave early to fulfil my parenting role or a variety of other circumstances that may arise because I am a parent, a partner, a sister and a daughter. It also gives me great satisfaction and pride to work alongside an executive leadership team who are humanistic and people focussed and make decisions to best support and promote a family friendly culture.
What’s next for your organisation in the DEIB and family-friendly space?
We have kicked off discovery work to better understand our DEIB (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging) landscape and how our team members feel about DEIB in our business. Recently, there have been facilitated round table discussions with leaders and listening sessions with team members. We have also added additional DEIB focussed questions on our full year engagement survey. These insights will form the basis of our DEIB strategy. We are also about to launch work in collaboration with Parents At Work partner Challenge DV, to educate and support our team members with understanding family and domestic violence along with providing first responder training next year and access to enhanced resources.
A big thank you to The a2 Milk Company for sharing your insights and learnings.
If your organisation would like to follow suit, you can contact our team to discuss what membership package would best support your needs.
