Posts Tagged ‘work-life-balance’

Best Practices, International Ambassadors

The Double-Burden Syndrome

Tuesday, October 11th, 2011 by Astrid Bosten

There is a new word popping up in media: The double burden syndrome. Sounds like a medical diagnostic? Somehow that’s right. The double burden syndrome is a phrase first time mentioned in McKinsey’s latest Women Matter study and describes the predominant barrier for women to proceed in their careers – the dual role and the double responsibility of women for their professional and domestic lives. This might not be a challenge on its own but in combination with the second most important burden for women to go to the top – the “anytime, anywhere” attitude – enormously collides with this a double-burden situation.

In a time when more mothers work full-time than ever before, My Family Care, an English work-life-balance strategy consultancy, asked about 1,400 parents and adult dependent carers about their double-burden challenges. The main results: over 60% of working parents are not happy with their work life balance and over half (54%) felt requesting flexibility may negatively affect their career.

One reason for this negative assumption is the rarely support of relatives or private networks who help out in a caring emergency (45%). 85% of all respondent parents need extra help when their regular care is unavailable and 33% of those responsible for eldercare also do.

So, what’s the cure for this situation? The old but always stay the same demand for flexible working opportunities: “When the leadership group sees flexibility as a way of doing business then there is no stigma in being a parent or carer who delivers outcomes in a range of ways other than sitting at a desk 9 to 5” says Ben Black of My Family Care. “More parents need to work full time but don’t want to miss out on those important milestones such as their child’s first school play or arriving home in time to see their children before bed and then catch up on work that evening; it is all about understanding mangers and a relationship of trust.”

For Henkel the family value is one of five corporate values and comes from the very beginning of our company history. Henkel has recognized the importance of a balanced professional and private life situation for male and female employees. Therefore trust-based working time is also part of our working principles as increasing offers of flexible workplace designs.

The reasons why it’s important to invest in those opportunities is obvious: companies will get greater engagement and productivity of their employees, increased employer retention and loyalty and reduced absenteeism. Enough reason for that?

What are your experiences? Do you face a double-burden challenge? And do you (already) take advantage of flexible working opportunities?

International Ambassadors

My first Experience at Henkel

Monday, September 26th, 2011 by Luisa Perez

Last August, 12th and 19th, for the first time in the history of Henkel in Mexico, our corporate offices opened the doors to approximately 50 children who literally came to work with mom or dad. This activity allowed the young to learn more about our organization, spend a joyful time for family life and discover what is dad or mom daily life in “the office”

It started with a breakfast in where parents and children participated in a brief conference about the origin of Henkel in Mexico. Subsequently, all in a row, led by a children’s group manager and Mr Pritt. Children had to visit our facilities to meet the people in the corporate office. Employees welcome the children as they came by, some bear gifts and others detailed explanations, and some were even allowed participating at meetings.

The experience did not end with the office tour, the group was divided, the youngest ones were sent to their parents to assist them in various administrative activities, including filing, write notes or other things, the older went to Human Resources department who trained them by applying mini job interview. After interviewing each of them joined with their parent to “work” for some hours else.

After this great work experience children were taken to the auditorium, where the group of animators started a series of fun games and activities, through these Henkel’s working culture was showcased. During the game course, children were to collect some “money”, which later was traded on the “Mini Henkel little shop” for various awards, such as detergents, promotional gifts or school supplies.

Still people talk about the laughter and shouts of joy lived along the 3 floors of our offices, having this positive contagious feeling to those who were present. All activities were properly guarded by a professional security team, who was carefully taking responsibility on safety, and of course to avoid disruption of normal flow of operations.

During this year Henkel in Mexico has implemented activities with the purpose of promoting work-life balance culture. Encouraging employees to learn to balance their personal lives and their work, which results in more effective performance of employees while, strengthens their commitment to the company.

My first experience Henkel was definitely a success. Both, children and their parents were amazed by how enriching it was this day of family life in our facilities.

Best Practices

Flexible working opportunities for fathers/ Flexible Arbeitsmöglichkeiten für Väter

Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011 by Astrid Bosten

In terms of work-life-balance and the reconcilability of family and career there has been a positive development in the last thirty years. The increasing employment of women, and the related need to improve the relationship between work and family life, led to a multiplicity of rights around maternity leave and flexible working opportunities. Even men have gained some rights, but there is still a gap between the work-life-balance opportunities of women and men. Also working fathers have the wish to spend time with their families and to care for their children actively.

In the study „Working and Fathers – Combining family life and work“ by the Lancaster University School of Management and the organization “Working Families” in the UK fathers were asked how they combine work and family life. They also examined how stress and well-being depend on the integration of work and family life and how flexible working time models could support men to be both, engaged employees and fathers.

The key findings are:

  • A general trend shows that fathers who have more flexible work options tend to be less troubled by stress, and have an improved sense of purpose and wellbeing.
  • Fathers who work flexibly have better work-life-balance and are able to deal with work overload more effectively than those with no flexibility.
  • Work relationships appear to be significantly more troubling for fathers on a low income compared to the high earners. However, when they use flexible working in some way, these concerns become much less troubling.

These results lead to the discussion if fathers do have the opportunity to work in a way which allows them to reach their full potential and also have the involvement in family life to which they aspire?

Here you can read the entire study and inform yourself in detail. [DE]

  (more…)

Diversity & Inclusion

Generation Y and the Workplace – Implications for office design (3) / Generation Y und ihr Arbeitsplatz – wie sollte er gestaltet und ausgestattet sein? (3)

Monday, May 30th, 2011 by Anke Meier


We are posting our last comment, featuring the Annual Report 2010 of OXYGENZ.com and Johnson Controls about Generation Y and the Workplace.

We learned who Generation Y is and how they want to work. Today we close our series with the huge implications in designing the office space for our future or actual colleagues.

Even though this Gen Y is highly connected and fluent in the virtual world, the virtual office will not work. As many companies believed, that increasing home office and providing only hot desks to their employees will save space and money; this concept might not fully work in reality. The survey clearly showed that Gen Y has a desire for a personalized work place in the office. This contradicts with the wish to work anytime – anywhere. However, the workspace can and should be designed flexibly to allow for different teams settings when needed.

Of great importance also is the establishment of informal meeting areas, so that networking and communication are possible. This of course requires a different understanding of “work”, which must not necessarily be bound to the workplace as such. This might be a challenge within the company, where different working styles have to come together and be mutually accepted.

In relation to the desire for work-life Balance, other services should be accessible within the workplace; such as laundry services, canteen, gym, hairdresser, etc.

In terms of the technology to be provided, a mobile phone and a laptop are seen to be the natural ingredients for a work space, as everybody has one privately. The “status” function of these devices is no longer true. Additional productivity should offset the cost. Enterprise networks can release the wisdom of the crowd, leading to more innovation and better results.

Finally, we can conclude that there is a highly qualified and motivated workforce out there. We have to make sure that we embrace those new ways of thinking and working with an inclusive working environment. Because lastly, that´s what everybody – independent of the generation – expects: Valuation and appreciation of performance and a motivating working atmosphere.

What do you think? Wouldn´t that be nice?

(more…)

International Ambassadors

Changing Role of Men and Women

Wednesday, May 25th, 2011 by Lena Rumjanceva

Several women in top management, female networking group “Women in Leadership”, WoMen’s Networking Day at Henkel’s headquarters in Düsseldorf… All of these are evidence that women have top priority at Henkel.

We live in a constantly changing world. In the past the role of men and women were considerably separated from each other. Women took the domination in the family, their major roles were looking after the children and the slave doing housework. They were always believed to be weaker than men; they were not allowed to study and have a job. Men earned money and in this way maintained their family. Their role was appreciated in larger measure.

As a matter of fact the situation has changed. In the 21st century the sharp difference between the roles of genders seem to disappear or wear off at least. The principle of suffragette or feminist movements was that women are victimized, subordinated against men in any field of the life. They wanted equality at home, at work, in politics so in any field of their life?

At this point in time not only the roles but also the different features of genders have changed.

Women can be discriminated at the workplace neither. If a woman applicant is suitable for a job, she is by law entitled to have it. Because of this fact there are more and more families in which it is the woman who earns more money. Wives build a career, maintain their family financially.

Is it normal? Can men of our world take over the responsibilities and tasks which were original attributed to women? Stay home with the baby, get the maternity benefit, bring up the children, and do the housework? Meanwhile wives drive their company car, tear with their briefcase, make telephone calls all day long, do businesses and get home to their family late afternoon.

Can women do their best at their workplace and still have energy for men and children as well? And is it good for the children that it is the ‘stronger gender’ who brings them up?

To answer these questions let’s see one of the numerous example at Henkel CEE:

What is your position at Henkel?
I am a MC2B manager, Excom member, having country responsibilities for a functional area.

Big responsibility, you have a lot of work to do, I guess.
It’s true that I’m really busy, have to travel a lot, so have pretty little time for my family.

How can you combine family and work? Do you have children?
I have a 6 years old boy. He was 1 years old when I came back from maternity leave and at that time we had to take a decision with my husband about the future share of roles within the family. I was in higher position and had higher income, so we decided that the best for us and for our child was that we changed the traditional roles.

So how does the job-sharing look like in your family?
My husband stays at home, cooks, does the housework, looks after our son. Meanwhile I guarantee the stable financial background for the family.

And how can you do your’s share at home?
I spend as much time with my family as I can – but this is not too much. We always plan the weekly program together, I tell them when I have to travel or have to stay in the office till late evening during the week. I always spend one afternoon in the week with my son. This gives a bit of freedom to my husband as well. When I promise something to my son I definitely keep it. And he knows it well.

How are your weekends?
Very intensive. We organize different programs together, I play a lot with my son and I largely do my share in housework as well.

Does this model work?
Yes it does. My son is used to it. This is the natural status for him. My husband does not seem to suffer at all. We really have a balanced – I can also say – happy family life.

Thank you for the interview. I wish you good luck for you in your family life and at Henkel as well.

This is an example from real life at Henkel. Dear readers! What is your opinion about such family models?

Diversity & Inclusion

Doing the Chores… / Das bisschen Haushalt…

Thursday, April 21st, 2011 by Astrid Bosten

Men are responsible for assuring their family’s livelihood and women are responsible for hearth and home – of course without being paid for the work! That has been the typical role allocation which had persisted for centuries and which has not been changed until the 19th century in consequence of the female emancipation.

Nowadays it is common for women to work and to assure their own livelihood or the livelihood of their family. Women have become independent and are capable to master their lives without depending on men. In recent 15 years the importance of women’s income has increased and the traditional design of the male bread-earner crumbles. By this time about 18 percent of the German women are bread-earners. This can be referred to their situation as a single mother or to their partners who are not able to fulfil the role of the main earner. According to studies women on the one hand do not have equal rights as a man – have a look at the Gender Pay Gap study – but they are headed in the right direction and are supported by economy and politics.

Now there is the question coming up who is – within the age of emancipation – responsible for the unpaid tasks such as housework, child education, and elder care?

A survey carried out by the “Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)” shows that an average citizen works about 3.5 hours every day without being paid, whereas Germany exceeds this average with 3.6 working hours. Women still do the majority of the housework – no matter if they are employed or not. In comparison to German men, German women spend roughly 100 additional minutes for the daily housework, child education or care. Among the typical men jobs are still repairs or activities of craftsmen and there are few men who clean the house, cook or educate the children. In relation to voluntary work men and women are with 3 percent on the same level.

According to OECD the high share of women who does unpaid work can be referred to the higher percentage of women who – in contrast to the majority of men – work part-time instead of working full-time or is unemployed. Those countries which have a higher share of women in full-time employment also have a higher share of men doing unpaid work. Thus, the following can be recorded: The higher the share of employed women is, the higher is the balance of the total-working hours of men and women, paid as well as unpaid.

However, this is easier said than done: Women still have to face disadvantage on the job market because woman’s jobs are underpaid and there are slight chances for women to advance in those positions that are highly compensated. Due to that fact households in which women are the main earners often can be found in the sector of low income. And this is where the circle is completed: A survey carried out by the “Science Centre Berlin for Social Research” shows that wealthy women more often draw on household help and therefore must spend less time for unpaid housework than “poorer” women have to. Thus, the majority of the women have to do the housework on their own. Now, one could conclude what ought to be changed in order to decrease the unpaid working hours for women and to ensure an equality of total working hours for men and women: Firstly the childcare possibilities ought to be enhanced in order to give women the chance of working full-time – or the men ought to do the childcare. Secondly the career possibilities for women ought to be enhanced in order to give women the chance of having responsible and well paid jobs – and thirdly the salaries for men and women ought to be adjusted.

 

Apropos: If unpaid work was considered for the measurement of social welfare within the gross domestic product, the gross domestic product of an above average OECD-country would increase about 30 to 50 percent – according to the scheduled hourly wage.

(more…)

Women in Business

Powerwomen in Dialogue / Starke Frauen im Gespräch

Wednesday, March 30th, 2011 by Astrid Bosten

The starting event of our internal women’s network at Henkel “Women in Leadership” (WiL) in 2011 was the high-light-event at the same time: the round-table discussion with Simone Bagel-Trah our chairwoman of the shareholder committee and of the supervisory board at Henkel. 

So far, she is the first and only woman who is chairwoman of the supervisory board at a DAX-30-company. There were 120 women attending this event which was organized by the working group “communications” of the WiL. Anneliese Wilsch-Irrgang who is the leader of the department Regional R&D Emerging Markets (U-W) was the moderator of the event and she succeeded in having an open and amicable talk to Simone Bagel-Trah. One of the thematic priorities was e.g. the new models for flexible working hours, which are oriented towards today’s rhythm of life of women and men. The participants discussed different concepts which included different part-time working possibilities, too. In the course of the two hour event a lively discussion about mentoring-programs, training- and coaching-measures, flexible working hours, valuation systems as well as different management styles was rapidly emerging. “The participants were delighted with the open atmosphere of the discussion”, this was the impression of the organizers at the end of the event.

Exchange of experience for women

There are monthly meetings and different events which are organized by the network “Women in Leadership (WiL). Within these conferences several topics are discussed such as career management, skills, reconcilement of family and work, or models of flexible working hours. Thus, experiences can be changed and there is the opportunity of getting an insight in other business units and functions.

(more…)

Best Practices, International Ambassadors

New Work-Life-Balance opportunities at Henkel in Mexico

Friday, March 11th, 2011 by Luisa Perez

As for March 1st  Henkel employees in Mexico will be able to have more options to balance their energy between work and private life.

Recognizing that life cycle has different demands regarding time management. Henkel in Mexico has launched four initiatives to support to employees during their life cycle.

1) Henkel employees will be able to extend their maternity leave by 45 additional without salary days from the termination of the legal period. This opens the possibility for the new mother to stay longer with her new born (or adopted) child. A local policy has been released with all the details.

2) The new paternity leave is extended to five paid days for new fathers by birth or adoption. Again, details are included within a local policy established for this purpose.

3) Commuting in Mexico is becoming quite time consuming; therefore if the type of job allows Henkel employees have the option to work from home one day per month. Agreement with supervisor is requested and documented to get an understanding on employee’s office availability.

4) In case home office is not an option for the employee another alternative is “Tiempo para ti”. This initiative allows the people working for Henkel not making use of the option of Home Office to take one afternoon off per month.  Time has to been compensated within the other working days. As in the other initiatives information relating these programs is properly documented in a local Henkel policy.

In Mexico these opportunities for employees are not market standards and very effective initiatives for leading Henkel to become an employer of choice.

Best Practices

How to survive the technology tsunami – five rules/Den Technologie-Tsunami überleben – fünf Regeln

Tuesday, February 15th, 2011 by Astrid Bosten

Technology, when used consciously, can be helpful in managing every day’s life where family and work seem to be colliding. There are people who prefer high-tech apparatus to manage both their work and family responsibilities on a single device, and there are others who prefer different gadgets, opting for separation of family and work concerns.

The world has sped up and people are expected to excel and deliver, and the path of work and life overlap to a degree. Due to unlimited access to information and technological advances we have entered a cycle of info-overload where we get caught up, and we must find ways to throw a kink into it to end the overload.

To be productive it is important to keep the work life merge in balance, and to keep the stress level down. Therefore it is necessary to observe several rules such as consciously limiting the news intake, stop always being available, do not respond to e-mails in the moment and limit your texting, don’t be so caught up in how other people define success, and stop multi-tasking.

By keeping in mind these rules and stopping just go with the flow we will be able to handle this technology, and info-overload. [DE]

(more…)

Best Practices

Real Quality of Life / Echte Lebensqualität

Thursday, January 13th, 2011 by Astrid Bosten

The German Newspaper „Zeit“ recently published an article about a man who works in a consultancy. Not really news, right? Really different from the usual consultant job is that he works in part-time. Four days a week, he travels is present at the client’s offices, and one day he stays at home and takes care for his three children. Beside he supports his wife in feeding the baby (even at night), cooking and bringing the two little kids to school and kindergarten.

A really good approach, although it seems not to be that revolutionary. For consultants it’s quite normal to have one home office day a week. But a step in the right direction. “It’s a lack of life quality if you miss the opportunity to see your children grow up”, says the portrayed consultant.

The German Minister of Family Affairs and the German Chamber of Industry and Commercial recognized the sign of the times and started an initiative for “Family oriented Working ”. Thereby they follow the request of parents to equally take care for their family but also for their careers. In reference to a research conducted by the GfK seven out of 10 women (70.5 %) and six out of 10 men (61.8 %) would prefer to work part time and thereby increase the hours they can spend together with their children. Actually just one third of men really dare to do so.

How this job share family model could look like shows a database of 100 good examples offered by the German Chamber for Family Affairs. The Research Center Family Oriented Personnel Policy of the Westfälische Wilhems-University in Münster and the Steinbeis-Hochschule Berlin developed a careerandfamily-index that shows how family frindly your enterprise really is… have a try! [DE]

  (more…)

« Older Entries
 

Bad Behavior has blocked 1444 access attempts in the last 7 days.