Shared Parental Leave fails to deliver for dads

For employers, managers, and leaders.

As decision-makers, you have the power to push for policies that allow all new parents to take parental leave — and the power to initiate the cultural shift necessary to encourage men to take advantage of parental leave entitlements. Take parental leave yourself, tell others about your brain training, and set an... See more

“Taking leave is not normative,” says Richard Petts, a sociologist who specializes in research on parental leave, when explaining the paternity leave statistics that show how few men actually take more than a week of paid leave. He saw why first-hand when he struggled to get time off after the birth of his own child and cobbled together some sick d... See more

That's exactly it. Research shows 80% of dads said they’d do anything to spend more time with their children. In Quebec, Canada, they ring-fenced properly paid paternity leave a number of years ago, and the uptake from men compared to the rest of Canada went through the roof. And this has so many benefits for society. There was one study by a unive... See more

Creating an environment where leave does not negatively affect promotions would be ideal. And, at a minimum, increasing transparency about the impact that paternity leave has on career trajectory and promotion timeline would be a valuable starting point. As one father noted, it is hard when there are “not many men taking time off, and managers and ... See more

The benefits of paternity leave begin in the home. Ninety percent of the men we interviewed noticed an improvement in their relationship with their partner. And their partners also felt that the support was critical to forging a stronger bond. “I think I would have resented him if he had been at work and I would have had to do all of this alone,” o... See more