How the fertility landscape is anticipated to change in 2022

Employees with families want more out of the workplace in 2022, and it’s in employers’ best interest to give it to them.

Parents make up 40% of the workforce, according to recent data provided by family benefits platform, Cleo. And not only were they hardest hit by the pandemic — caused by insufficient childcare options and family planning benefits — but they are the demographic expected to see the most additional change at work in the months ahead.

The pandemic brought every employer into their employees’ households, according to Sarahjane Sacchetti, CEO at Cleo. And what they saw made them rethink the kind of support they were giving.

“First and foremost employers are absolutely paying attention to families,” Sacchetti says. “From really large Fortune 50 companies to really small nonprofits, employers of all sorts are investing in [family support], and COVID was a huge accelerant.”

Read more:Give employees the gift of better benefits

Previously, family planning benefits were perceived as a perk or a privilege — one that wasn’t all too common. In 2019, approximately 478 companies globally offered family-building benefits that included adoption, foster care and fertility benefits, according to data from fertility insights platform FertilityIQ. That number has begun to creep up, growing 8% year-over-year until it reached approximately 800 companies by 2021.

“There are going to be the winners and losers out of employers who figure out our outdated view of how we support families,” Sacchetti says. “Today's and tomorrow's workforce include dads, include LGBTQ parents and include single parents who are looking for more flexible solutions.”

The same growth can be seen when it comes to paid maternity and paternity leave. Only 20% of private sector workers had access to paid family leave at the beginning 2020, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Now, over half of companies offer paid maternity leave, 45% offer paid paternity leave and 35 % provide paid extended family care leave (for biological births as well as adoption and surrogacy), and that growth is expected to continue, according to data from SHRM.

Read more: The true value of a fertility and family building benefit

To accommodate for all of that change, the new year may also bring new positions and job opportunities at progressive companies in order to guide employees through their new benefits and offerings.

“Certain employers we serve today already have these teams called Family or Caregiver Support,” Sacchetti says. “And [it’s because] employers are thinking about parents far more than ever before, whether it's pediatric mental health, specialty diagnosis or support just for the caregiver itself. These will be the huge trends as we go into 2022.”