From 6 weeks leave in case of miscarriage to 16 weeks off for surrogate parents, this group of agencies has introduced parental policies that we need today

• The policy offers 26 weeks of paid leave to birth parents - irrespective of their gender or marital status.
• It also gives 12 weeks of paid leave to commissioning parents, 16 weeks of paid leave for surrogate parents and 4 weeks of paid leave for foster parents, the policy has also factored in incidents that may potentially throw life out of gear.

Three agencies, part of one collective group, have rolled out an updated parental policy for their teams. These agencies include Never Grow Up, a Work Culture Consultancy, Yellow Seed, a Content Strategy and Development Agency & SPRD | Stories.PR.Digital, a digital-first Public Relations think tank.

Building on the normative changes we have witnessed in the 21st century, and those accelerated by the pandemic, the policy aims to solve employee issues concerning childbearing and rearing. It offers a better work-life blend in respect to household responsibilities for people of all genders and orientations and factors in multiple aspects of parenting.

The policy applies to any team member who has worked with the company for 90 days (probation period included) and aspires to become a parent through birth, legal adoption, commissioning through surrogacy, fostering, or choosing to become a surrogate carrier.

While the policy offers 26 weeks of paid leave to birth parents - irrespective of their gender or marital status, 12 weeks of paid leave to commissioning parents, 16 weeks of paid leave for surrogate parents and 4 weeks of paid leave for foster parents, the policy has also factored in incidents that may potentially throw life out of gear. For example, irrespective of your gender, in the event of a miscarriage, or the child/children being stillborn or in a situation of a declared medical termination of pregnancy, team members would be eligible for a total of up to 06 calendar weeks of paid leave immediately following the unfortunate circumstance & this is applicable to any number of incidents.

Asif Upadhye and Aashutosh Katre who are part of the management team, said, “This is not a policy to us. It is the way we think things should be. We want to emphasize the inherent value of a person and their life choices as opposed to ascribed identity tags and titles. Becoming a parent should not impact employee well-being negatively and the onus of ensuring this lies squarely with the employer. This is our way of leading the way for real empathy especially when corporate culture is known to work the other way round. The aim is to offer comprehensive leave to team member/s irrespective of their life choices to effectively manage emotional, biological, and psychological changes that come with being a parent & provide them paid - time off to take care of their health and well-being and bond with their child before returning to work.”

In addition to this, the all-inclusive gender, identity, and orientation neutral parental policy also factors in the pre and postpartum well-being of team members. It includes ergonomic seating, work from home, on-call counselor and creche reimbursements besides ensuring that appraisals are not impacted upon the return of a candidate.

Studies show that companies that offer paid parental leave value employees and their families. This policy goes a step further by allowing the scope of customizing one’s parental leaves as per life circumstances. Additionally, in the Indian legal landscape with just 8.2 percent of paternity leaves - with number of days differing from company to company - in comparison to maternity leave, the inclusion of emotional and psychological wellbeing of employees through actual tangible benefits is a progressive move - one that has the potential of normalizing the future of parenting.

It is well known that all 193 member countries of the UN offer paid parental leaves to their citizens with the exception of the USA. With many countries like Sweden and Norway leaps and bounds ahead and more companies incorporating parental benefits as a talent attraction and retention strategy, there remain gaps in including benefits not based on one’s marital status, one’s orientation or the process of bearing an offspring. Bereavement leaves and childcare management facilities are taking context in Indian society but are still not well-established. This policy is definitely a step forward.