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Wed, 7 Sep 2005 08:50:30 EDT
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How Employers Can Accommodate New Mothers at  Work
 
____________________________________
By Dan Woog
Monster Contributing Writer  

Susan Seitel, president of Minnesota-based consulting company Work &  Family 
Connection, remembers one client well. The woman had recently given birth  to 
her first child and was returning to work. Her infant cried all the way to  
day care. The mother cried all the way to the office. Unfortunately, Seitel sees 
 many other new mothers who can relate to the woman she described. 

Seitel  says that 47 percent of the American workforce is female, and 85 
percent of  those working women are or will become mothers. A _study_ 
(http://www.res.org.uk/society/mediabriefings/pdfs/2005/feb05/waldfogel.asp)  published in 
the February 2005 issue of the Economic  Journal reveals that 63 percent of 
women who work pre-birth come back to  work within 12 weeks of giving birth, 
with 37 percent of that group returning  full-time. 

Workplace accommodations for new mothers particularly are a  problem for 
women who breast-feed. According to an Ohio State University _study_ 
(http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/brstfeed.htm) ,  54 percent of women who return to 
full-time work within three months after  giving birth had to stop 
breast-feeding. That compares to only 35 percent of  women who did not return to work. 

Why Breast-Feed at Work?  

A 2003 Los Angeles County _health  survey_ 
(http://www.breastfeedingtaskforla.org/PR/081804.htm)  showed that workplaces friendly to breast-feeding 
decrease  absenteeism by up to 57 percent. But the same survey showed that 60 percent 
of  mothers stopped breast-feeding when they reported to work within six 
months of  giving birth. 

Karen Peters, executive director of the _Breastfeeding Task  Force of Greater 
Los Angeles_ (http://www.breastfeedingtaskforla.org/) , says the reason is 
simple: Most businesses do  not understand the economic and social benefits of 
breast-feeding. Breast-fed  babies tend to be healthy babies, and healthy 
babies mean fewer medical  expenses. Encouraging women to breast-feed at work means 
less staff turnover,  sick time and personal leave, lower healthcare costs, 
and higher job  productivity and morale. 

The _US Breastfeeding Committee_ (http://www.usbreastfeeding.org/)  estimates 
that for every $1  invested in breast-feeding support, a company saves $3 for 
an average savings of  $400 per breast-fed baby over the first year. 

Breast-Feeding  Accommodations 

Companies can provide new mothers with clean, private  rooms with sinks, 
breast pumps and refrigerators. Employers can also offer  part-time work options 
like reduced schedules, job sharing, phased-in returns,  flextime, compressed 
workweeks, drawing time from a paid-leave bank and  telecommuting. Allowing 
sufficient break time to breast-feed or express milk on  the job also can be 
helpful. Finally, employers can educate expectant and new  mothers, as well as 
managers and colleagues. 

Some employers already do  these things, led by Fortune 500 companies, Peters 
says. Lagging behind are  midsize and smaller firms. Peters terms the 
fast-food, retail, manufacturing and  agricultural sectors particularly negligent. In 
fast food and retail, most  workers are not unionized and are hesitant to ask 
for "special concessions,"  Peters explains. Manufacturing and agricultural 
workers have little privacy, and  many are paid piece rates, which create a 
disincentive to take breast-feeding  breaks. 

Providing breast-feeding accommodations at work is the law in 10  states. 
Thirty California breast-feeding organizations use a carrot-and-stick  approach 
to encourage local businesses to comply. The carrot includes giving  companies 
"mother-friendly awards" and providing breast-pump rentals. The stick  is 
fines: $100 per incident. However, as Peters notes, "it takes a brave woman  to 
take action against her employer." She does not know if any company has been  
fined. 

More Support of New Mothers 

New mothers have other  workplace concerns besides breast-feeding, including 
infant care. Misty Rose is  CEO of KidCentric, a Livermore, California, firm 
that helps companies organize  child-care programs. Although most of her work 
involves 2-to-5-year-olds, she  recalls one small company where two key 
employees were due to deliver at the  same time. KidCentric helped convert a portion 
of a warehouse into a care  facility licensed for four infants. Both women 
returned to work within six  weeks. 

"The best companies subsidize infant care heavily, because they  realize it's 
the best thing for them and their working mothers," Rose says. She  cites 
large companies like Cisco Systems and Sun Microsystems as being at the  
forefront of infant-care issues. 

However, Judith Stadtman Tucker, editor  of _The Mothers Movement  Online_ 
(http://www.mothersmovement.org/) , says Silicon Valley and the legal, 
journalism and broadcast  professions are notorious for being mother-unfriendly. "Part 
is the business  itself, part is the culture," she says. "In the 'elite' 
professions, it's hard  to stay at the top of your game and also be involved in 
families." 

And,  Tucker says, while large corporations have noble-sounding formal 
policies for  new mothers, small businesses may be more flexible. "In a small 
company, people  know each other," she explains. "If your sitter gets sick, it's OK 
to bring your  kid to the office." 

The best solution, Tucker says, is to keep new  mothers in the work flow 
mainstream while recognizing that even the best  employees can get temporarily 
sidetracked by the demands of new motherhood.  




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