How employers can ensure safe, stable and nurturing family environments

FAMILY-FRIENDLY WORKPLACE

If you were asked to describe the familyfriendly nature of your business, where would you begin? Would you highlight family-leave benefits for parents and caregivers, or the cost of your healthcare plan?

Would you emphasize flexible time-off policies, investments in employee physical and mental well-being, or maybe your onsite child care service?

Whatever your focus, Granite Staters are still emerging from a Covid-19 pandemic that impacted family finances, caregiver roles and child mental health, as well as other aspects of family life. Two years later, those same families are facing yet another set of obstacles in the form of inflation, lack of child care and troubles accessing community resources.

Research tells us that when challenges like this grow, caregiver stress rises, and reports of abuse and neglect skyrocket.

A recent study conducted by Wisconsin’s Division for Children, Youth and Families found that “when families experience a negative earnings shock of 30 percent or more, the likelihood of becoming involved with child protective services grew by 18 percent.”

The same study also showed that with each additional earnings drop, DCYF involvement for affected families increased by 15 percent. So the correlation between diminishing salaries and reports to state child protective services is profound.

That parallel was diminished when families were compensated through the receipt of benefits.

We, at NH Children’s Trust, are fortunate to have those opportunities readily available through Family Support of New Hampshire in the form of family-strengthening programs and a myriad of other resources. All are free, voluntary and confidential, and available to residents across the state.

What we look to do is to ensure safe, stable and nurturing environments for children and families.

Family Support of New Hampshire is an effort that recognizes our labor force spends, on average, nine hours each day in a work-related environment. Whether that environment is family-friendly has influence in the life of an employee, who are also mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, aunts, uncles, friends and much more.

What can New Hampshire businesses do to become family-friendly?

• Establish paid family leave to ensure parents can spend quality time with their children when they need it the most.

• Support access to affordable and quality child care to ensure that children have access to early childhood education and can develop the skills they need to reach their full potential.

• Grant flexible working time arrangements through work-from-home policies and other measures.

• Ensure decent working conditions, such as wages that reflect the cost of living for families.

• Promote family-friendly policies and connection to community resources with employees, suppliers and other business partners.

At its core, working to strengthen families requires an “upstream mentality” that ensures both the child and caregiver have what they need before there is a problem. At the Children’s Trust, we call that primary prevention. We know that when families have what they need, they are better equipped to meet challenges in the roles and responsibilities they have, including those of their employment.

Thankfully, prevention is an action we can all take.

Whether it is family-friendly work policies, connecting a caregiver to family resources, encouraging positive parenting strategies or promoting self-care routines, prevention means each of us embracing our own role in making sure New Hampshire caregivers and their kids have what they need to be successful.

Prevention is the understanding that the health and well-being of our employees’ families plays a role in whether our enterprise will be successful. It is reminding ourselves that our culture is what will allow us to grow and remain steady in times of global upheaval.

Join us for the 2022 #IAmPrevention campaign and help build supportive environments for children and families across the Granite State. Visit nhchildrenstrust.org to get involved.

Cliff Simmonds, executive director of the NH Children’s Trust, can be reached at 603-415-0322.