Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves • Hacker News Board

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#31

Post by fastbeef » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:53 PM UTC

Rebelgecko wrote: post #10

fastbeef wrote: post #3

I’m not surprised. This is so different to how workplaces are usually run in the US that organizations, or society even, has no institutional memory on how to deal with it. In Sweden, where 400+ days of parental leave has been mandatory for years organization have adapted and learned patterns and ways to deal with people dissappearing for around a year. It’s a shame the Gates Foundation didn’t research this better be…

Are those 400+ days per parent or divvied up between the parents? I imagine that can have a big impact on how the leave affects companies.

It’s per child, with a percentage ear marked for each parent and the rest is up to the parent to decide to gets them.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#32

Post by rb808 » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:53 PM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #2

“How do other countries do it?” Well it’s not an employer deciding whether it’s done so organizations just deal with it. And yes it does give effects that last years and disrupt organizations three layers deep. But it happens to all organizations, so it’s not a competitive disadvantage.

In reality its not that simple. Its often extra difficult for 30-35 year old women to find new jobs as employers are wary. Its also more difficult for women to return to work after taking longer off. Discrimination lawsuits are more common in Europe from what I've seen.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#33

Post by DavidHm » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:53 PM UTC

simonsarris wrote: post #22

xutopia wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We hire interims or share responsibilities between other members of the team. It happens all the time and we rarely find an issue with this. If any company is run in such a way that bus-factor means the company can't thrive with one person gone you're simply doing it wrong.

This seems like the most obvious dodge. I know plenty of companies, especially small ones, where any person in the company is pretty much the bus factor. When they take vacation the company shuts its doors for a few weeks. This is obviously true for startups and small restaurants, especially ones without gobs of VC funding. Is the solution just to exclude companies that cannot get by without doing this? In other word…

If the company is utterly reliant on a single person, that person is either an equity owner, or should be, and the owner is taking advantage of them.

If you own in part the business, then imho you take as much or little parental leave as you want/can afford.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#34

Post by bargl » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:53 PM UTC

The fact that after they backed off of the leave they are giving out a 20K bonus for child care is amazing in and of itself.

I'm surprised that's not emphasized more. They probably also have very flexible work environment for parents so that when daycare's are closed and other issues crop up the parents can get back in there.

I'm a dad of 2, 2 years and 5 year. I don't know if I'd want a year off to stay home with the kids. I'd have loved to get 3 months instead of the 1 month i did get but a year... That just sounds like a lot of cabin fever to me. I'm sure a lot of people would appreciate it, so I'm 100% not knocking it at all. This new benefit is more attractive to me at least.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#35

Post by throwawaysea » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:54 PM UTC

I'm fine with this. They have to strike a reasonable and sustainable balance.

Thinking more broadly, I am not sure it makes sense to subsidize having more children. Sustaining the standard of living we expect today with the population numbers we have is simply not viable, since those standards carry heavy externalities.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#36

Post by Haydos585x2 » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:54 PM UTC

beart wrote: post #9

As a parent, I would much rather take that year and use it to shorten my normal working week for as long as possible. With 260 working days a year, you could work 4 days a week for the first five years of your child's life.

In Australia that's not unheard of. Plenty of women (and men) will go to a 3 or 4 day work week for a longer stretch rather than taking a full 12 months off.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#37

Post by shados » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:55 PM UTC

xutopia wrote: post #14

simonsarris wrote: post #11

> [heading] How do they manage in Canada? > In Canada, companies have had no option but to make 52-week parental leaves work, when requested, since 2000. The question Canadian companies ask isn’t “Can we do it?” but “How do we do it?” Okay, so... how do they do it? They never answer the question. If you have say, a CFO or a specialist mechanic (that you only need 1 of, but definitely need) and they take a year off, w…

We hire interims or share responsibilities between other members of the team. It happens all the time and we rarely find an issue with this. If any company is run in such a way that bus-factor means the company can't thrive with one person gone you're simply doing it wrong.

It's not that they can't thrive in a pinch and more "what do you do when it's normal". Let's also remember that the person can have multiple kids in a row. A long time ago I worked at a company where the VP of a department ended up with 3 kids back to back. By the time they came back it was basically a different company and no one remembered them. The company couldn't tell ahead of time if this was going to keep going or not, so they had a new permanent VP, and no real room for an extra one. They basically split up the department in 2 for no real reason since they had to give the person a similar job back. It was really weird.

Obviously those are extreme case. Companies are dealing with it all the time now, and it's pretty normal. They make it work.

But there's no real argument that it leads to some really awkward situations sometimes.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#38

Post by pfyra » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:55 PM UTC

noidea_ wrote: post #17

fastbeef wrote: post #3

I’m not surprised. This is so different to how workplaces are usually run in the US that organizations, or society even, has no institutional memory on how to deal with it. In Sweden, where 400+ days of parental leave has been mandatory for years organization have adapted and learned patterns and ways to deal with people dissappearing for around a year. It’s a shame the Gates Foundation didn’t research this better be…

Yeah, but in Sweden, it's not a huge deal if the person that makes the Ikea meatballs takes a year off

While in the US it is a big deal, or what?

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#39

Post by alkonaut » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:55 PM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #5

alkonaut wrote: post #2

“How do other countries do it?” Well it’s not an employer deciding whether it’s done so organizations just deal with it. And yes it does give effects that last years and disrupt organizations three layers deep. But it happens to all organizations, so it’s not a competitive disadvantage.

Except on a global scale.

Anectdotally long parental leaves correlates with high productivity. Doesn’t tell us which way the causation points but there are factors like a large fraction of women in the workforce that pull in the right direction on a national level but don’t help individual companies.

I’d support it even if the causation is only the other way - i.e. it’s a reform people in rich productive countries choose to spend on.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#40

Post by fastbeef » Tue, Feb 05, 2019, 9:55 PM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #6

fastbeef wrote: post #3

I’m not surprised. This is so different to how workplaces are usually run in the US that organizations, or society even, has no institutional memory on how to deal with it. In Sweden, where 400+ days of parental leave has been mandatory for years organization have adapted and learned patterns and ways to deal with people dissappearing for around a year. It’s a shame the Gates Foundation didn’t research this better be…

People aren't easily replaceable...especially high talent individuals. It's also a big burden for an organization to pay for non-productive workers. And if someone has several children in a row...then what? What are the limits?

Its paid by the government, funded by taxes, at the same level as sick leave/disability. Some (most) companies actually chip in a little (or a lot) to ease the income loss as a perk.