Paternity leave is the key to equity at work and at home

Families are unique — the employee benefits that support that journey should be, too.

Family planning benefits are becoming increasingly in-demand in the workplace, yet often focus on supporting female employees with fertility, birth and postnatal support. While important, employers should be aware of the shifting definition of a “traditional family” and make sure their benefits support all individuals, says Paris Wallace, CEO of Ovia Health, a digital health platform.

“There are a lot of different types of families,” Wallace says. “This idea that there’s a married couple and the wife is going to have the child through natural conception is less than 50% of births. So we need to rethink this as less of a gender issue and more of a family issue.”

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Wallace chatted with Employee Benefit News about the shifting attitudes around family planning benefits and why policies like paternity and family leave can help move workplace equity forward.

What are some of the ways that the family planning benefits are shifting to include men, LGBTQ and other employees?

Traditionally, these have been women-focused benefits because at a high level, there’s a lot of focus on the person who is giving birth. But there’s a trend now to have parental leave versus just maternity leave — we’re seeing the most progressive employers offer parental leave that is flexible. We’re also seeing more cultural encouragement for men to take advantage of the benefits that are offered.

Moms actually go through childbirth, in some cases. But bonding, being able to navigate this new identity and new lifestyle is a challenge for all parents, regardless if they're male or female, or adopt or go through IVF or surrogacy.

What is Ovia doing to support all employees along the way?

We really are focused on the entire family journey — our benefits address both male and female fertility issues, and we also provide benefits and information around surrogacy and adoption. We have comprehensive benefits navigation and coaching to ensure people are doing things like taking advantage of parental leave and letting their health insurer know they have a new dependent. We also do manager trainings so they understand that anyone who is starting a family is going to have some pretty big changes and might need more flexibility or rethink how they're working.

Ovia can be accessed by multiple partners through our app. We see that both moms and dads and partners, and other folks who were involved in that family starting process are all using our application to help navigate their benefits and navigate their family building process.

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How can family planning benefits and family leave actually help create less pressure on women and close the career gap between male and female employees?

Right now the burden of giving birth and then taking time off of work and then being the primary caregiver is all falling on women. So it really disproportionately burdens women in the workplace. If you can say, all new parents are expected to take this time off, that really levels the playing field and takes the weight off of women who were already bearing the bulk of the weight for this decision.

This is a lot more than just a parenting issue. It's really an equity issue in the workforce. Employers are really starting to understand that and embrace it as a way to level the playing field for women and support their employees in doing the most important work they're going to do in their life, which is starting a family.