“At Deloitte, we’re committed to creating a safe, respectful and inclusive culture and an even playing field for everyone. We know that one powerful and effective way we can do this is by supporting our people with family caring responsibilities. We are incredibly proud to be recognised for our commitment to creating a workplace where our people can have exciting and rewarding careers and work in a flexible and family friendly way”
At Deloitte, we want all our people to have a great career experience and reach their full potential. We know that juggling a career and a family comes with its joys and challenges and we aim to create a supportive, caring and inclusive workplace for families, in which our policies, culture and leaders are actively family friendly.
We recognise that supporting working families is critical to attracting and retaining great talent. We want to ensure that our people can integrate their work and family lives and manage both their own wellbeing and that of the people around them.
We also want to play a role in a societal gender equality shift. We know that supporting working families is an important way to help to create this shift, enabling men to play and enjoy a greater role in caring responsibilities.
We have implemented a number of programs and initiatives to support our working families, including:
• Deloitte Experience – Built on trust, our new Deloitte Experience empowers our people to make choices about where, when and how they work, based on client, team and individual needs. The Deloitte experience is grounded in 6 key principles, one of which is ‘empowering with flexibility’ recognising the need for our people to work in way that enables them to manage their whole life.
• DeloitteFlex – Our market-leading refreshed flexible working framework, DeloitteFlex gives our people access to a range of twelve flexible working options designed to be used in combination to empower our people to live and work in a way that works best for them. We recently introduced ‘FamilyFlex’ as one of our Flex types, designed to recognise the juggle that those with caring responsibilities face. FamilyFlex offers a combination of Flex options for our people, including the opportunity to flex their start and finish times, work in a location that suits them, purchase additional annual leave and dial down travel requirements in the case they need to support their family.
• Flexible Parental Leave – At Deloitte, we offer flexibility and choice in parental leave. Our market-leading policy provides 18 weeks of paid leave, inclusive of all types of families including birth, adoptive, surrogate, foster and same-sex parents. This can be taken over the first 36 months after the arrival of a child in a range of flexible ways. We continue to pay superannuation contributions while taking unpaid parental leave and give people the option to take leave at the same time as their co-parent.
• Return to Work – This is a recruiting program for people (Deloitte and non-Deloitte) who have taken an extended career break. It includes a fully paid, 24-week intern-style transition program back into the workplace.
• Reconnect Program – We offer a tailored coaching program developed by Parents At Work. The program provides parents with the know-how, confidence, and support on ways to advance their careers and balance their lives and families. Parents are entitled to 1:1 coaching sessions and can access a portal with a range of resources and materials to help them navigate parenthood.
• Deloitte Dads – Part of our balanced approach to gender equity has led to a focus on removing barriers for men to participating in parental leave and flexible working. Our Deloitte Dads initiative aims to actively and consistently encourage more men to share caring responsibilities within their families, by taking extended parental leave and working flexibly.
Our certification as a Family Friendly Workplace is a commitment to continuing to embed a family-inclusive workplace culture at Deloitte, through the implementation and measurement of initiatives and policies and through visible leadership.
We know the definition of families extends far beyond parental leave and the way people define their family is unique. We are mindful of this as we continue to evolve our approach and offerings.
At Deloitte, we believe that supporting working families is critical to employee engagement, supporting work-life integration and employee wellbeing, as well as attraction and retention of talent. We understand the clear link between a happy, healthy and engaged workforce and business outcomes.
One of Deloitte’s Partners, Ella White, has shared her experience taking parental leave and working flexibly. Ella is a Partner in Deloitte’s Audit & Assurance team and the mother of three-and-a-half-year-old, Patrick, and a one-and-a-half-year-old, Aoife. For her first child, Ella took six months of parental leave and her husband, who also works at Deloitte, took an additional six months so they could share caring responsibilities for Patrick’s first year.
For her second child, Ella took twelve months and her husband took six months, benefiting from Deloitte’s shared Parental Leave Policy. Ella reflects, “The fact that my husband could take his parental leave flexibly and be with our children in that early period has had a much bigger impact on me than just taking parental leave myself. It changed my entire experience as a mum, and importantly, gave me a sense of equality – I couldn’t have gone back to work at 6 months without it”.
Ella now uses DeloitteFlex, flexing her hours during the week to take meetings around school pick-ups and log back on for a couple of hours in the evening. She also uses Friday afternoons to spend precious time with her 1 year old. Ella shares, “Flexing like this while my kids are little really adds to my family life”.
When asked about her career, Ella said, “I have had my biggest promotion and acceleration of learning whilst being pregnant and having kids (being promoted to Partner the day after my son was born). I didn’t feel like there were barriers because I had kids – I’ve been encouraged to pursue interests and take on additional leadership roles as a Partner, since having kids. Overall, being able to bring my two worlds together has benefited me immensely – at work, I’m more efficient and more productive, while still getting to spend valuable time with my family at home.”
“At Deloitte, we’re committed to creating a safe, respectful and inclusive culture and an even playing field for everyone. We know that one powerful and effective way we can do this is by supporting our people with family caring responsibilities. We are incredibly proud to be recognised for our commitment to creating a workplace where our people can have exciting and rewarding careers and work in a flexible and family friendly way”
Parents At Work acknowledge and pay respect to the past, present and future Traditional Custodians and Elders of this nation and the continuation of cultural, spiritual and educational practices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
