UK Businesses not doing enough to support staff

Three-quarters of staff report difficulty balancing job and home life

UK businesses are running the risk of losing key talent from the workplace by not doing enough to support staff with caring responsibilities, joint research from the Employers Network for Equality and Inclusion (enei) and My Family Care has revealed.

Just 38 per cent of employers monitor the caring responsibilities of their workforce, despite the fact that one in nine UK workers now combine paid work with caring for parents, grandparents, siblings or partners.

In a survey of 1,000 consumers and 100 employers, one in three (33 per cent) HR managers said they had introduced specific policies or communications for carers at work.

However, more than a third (35 per cent) of the consumers surveyed said they rarely or never had any kind of support network available to them – unlike new parents who tend to build a network of people going through the same ‘ages and stages’ as them.

In a separate survey of more than 4,500 carers by Carers UK, almost one in 10 (nine percent) carers rated the workplace as the least carer-friendly in their community.

Despite 46 per cent saying that their employer provided a carer-friendly working environment, more than a third (34 per cent) said the workplace failed to consider their needs or provide adequate support.

Over half of respondents said it made looking after the person they care for more difficult, and nearly three quarters (74 per cent) said it had a negative impact on their physical or mental health.

A spokesman for Carers UK said the rise in pension age and an ageing population meant that more and more people would have to balance caring responsibilities and paid work in future, and the workplace had a key role to play in building carer-friendly communities.

Employees said their line managers were key to helping them balance work and family, and many called for greater flexibility at work.

However, more than half (52 per cent) of carers were concerned that flexible working would adversely affect their career progression, with 63 per cent of people believing that those working flexibly could be seen as less committed by their company or colleagues.

Three-quarters (75 per cent) of employees said a lack of support from their employer made it more difficult to work alongside caring.

Commenting on his organisation’s report, Ben Black, director of My Family Care said: “A big thing that came out of our research was the sheer diversity of their caring responsibilities – what they do, how they do it, who they care for, how many hours are involved and how they feel about it.

“While working parents are easy for employers to spot, carers of parents, grandparents, partners or siblings come in all shapes and sizes and often feel uncomfortable talking about their private lives at work.

"As a result it’s so important for businesses to reach out, find out more about their employees otherwise they risk losing their very best talent,” he added.

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