Burnout

What Is Neurodivergent Masking & How It Leads to Burnout

2025-01-02T07:01:57-05:00

New data suggests that burnout is again on the rise. Ignoring the needs of neurodivergent employees offers a compelling explanation.

Burnout is on the rise again in 2024, and managers are missing the signs.

A new survey from The Harris Poll and The Grossman Group found that while 89% of managers say their employees are thriving, only 24% of workers said the same.

“We have lost awareness of this issue at the manager level,” says David Grossman, CEO of The Grossman Group, a leadership and communications consultancy. “Senior leadership is so focused on other priorities that this has fallen off the radar.”

Having a leader who is tuned into employee well-being makes a huge difference.

A study from UKG found that managers impact employees’ mental health more than doctors or therapists, and 81% of employees worldwide prioritize good mental health over a high-paying job.

During and immediately after the pandemic, managers learned the importance of one-on-one check-ins with employees, what Grossman calls an “emotional check-in.” A short conversation about what is going on with employees both at work and in their lives can build trust and engagement.

“We’ve forgotten how successful these conversations were,” Grossman says.

Neurodivergent masking

One explanation for burnout in the workplace is a lack of inclusion for neurodivergent employees.

Researchers believe that there might be as many as 1.2 billion neurodivergent people worldwide, which suggests that every company has at least one neurodivergent employee.

However, most companies don’t know much about these employees. Only one in 10 employees within a disability category disclose their status to an employer, and nearly half (45%) of neurodivergent professionals would not feel comfortable asking for support or adjustments at work.

When neurodivergent professionals don’t disclose their status — called “masking” — these employees are spending extra energy to fit in and avoid detection. This extra effort can take a toll over time, says Ed Thompson, CEO of Uptimize, a platform for awareness and education around neurodiversity in the workplace. At Accenture, No. 7 on the Fortune 100 Best 카지노 커뮤니티 추천 to Work For® List in 2024, over 16,000 employees have used the platform.

“In the neurodivergent community, people talk about burnout all the time,” Thompson says. When employees don’t feel like they can disclose their status, they don’t have a psychologically safe environment. In short, they don’t trust their organization.

Great Place To Work® research has shown that when employees decline to share parts of their identity with their employer, workplace trust suffers. For every 10% of employees who chose not to respond to survey questions about their identity, there was a six-point decrease in overall levels of trust at a given company.

A threat for retention

Burnout isn’t just a threat to engagement. Employees are more likely to leave a job rather than try to get help for a mental health issue, according to Ramona Schindelheim, editor-in-chief at WorkingNation, a nonprofit focused on helping employees thrive in the modern workplace.

“Employees are leaving their jobs because of not feeling comfortable talking about their mental health issues,” Schindelheim says. “Instead of having to seek an accommodation or try to talk out an issue with a boss, they just leave their job instead.”

As companies face a talent shortage, particularly for highly skilled workers, any barrier to acquiring talent is a problem. “When you see that there is a need for talent, doing anything to take that talent off the table has an impact on the bottom line,” Schindelheim says.

A better workplace for everyone

Why should leaders focus on neurodiversity when tackling burnout and mental well-being?

Solving workplace issues for neurodivergent employees has the potential to improve well-being outcomes all employees. At the For All Summit™ in New Orleans, Dr. Daniel Wendler, a researcher and expert on neurodiversity in the workplace, spoke about the power of universal design.

“When you design with everyone in mind, it makes it better for everybody,” Wendler says.

One simple step: Make sure to publicize your commitment to diversity and inclusion for all disabilities.

“If you can say that you are open to all disabilities, and include in that public statement that you recognize this includes mental health, neurodiversity, and physical disabilities, you can make sure that a current or a prospective employee understands this is a welcoming environment that recognizes talent exists in everyone,” says Schindelheim.

카지노 커뮤니티 추천 can do a lot of good just by raising awareness, Thompson says. “I know it’s not sexy, but what we hear from people is that they would trade a free yoga class for people having basic appreciation of people thinking differently,” he says.

Tips for inclusion

Here are some ways companies can break down barriers and help neurodivergent employees find a sense of belonging:

1. Update the “golden rule”

“Treat others the way you want to be treated” is good advice, but can be problematic if leaders assume that everyone’s experience matches their own. Instead, great leaders should create room for a variety of experiences.

“Everyone will want to contribute, but not in the same way,” Thompson says. Make sure you extend the flexibility and space to others that you would want for yourself.

2. Share your inclusive message with current and prospective employees.

New hires are looking for signals that your workplace is welcoming and inclusive, but it’s an important message for your current workforce as well.

It’s not always an employee’s boss who can make them uncomfortable when disclosing a disability or specific status, says Schindelheim. “Sometimes it’s their co-workers.”

An inclusive environment is the responsibility of every employee, not just management.

3. Track the positive/negative cycle

When one employee has a positive experience sharing their story or status with their employer, that can create a positive cycle, says Thompson. When an employee has a negative experience, that also reverberates throughout the organization.

4. Survey your workforce

If you don’t know how neurodivergent employees are experiencing the workplace, go get that data. “Give your people an opportunity to tell you,” Thompson says.

When looking to gather data, it’s crucial to empower employees to share their stories in a way that makes them comfortable. These employees are not looking for amateur diagnosticians to label them, Thompson warns.

“It’s not about identifying who is who,” he says. Instead, companies should ask: “What can we do to allow everybody to contribute their best?”

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How to Prevent Employee Burnout: 5 Effective Strategies

2024-05-11T07:01:27-04:00

Here’s what great workplaces are doing to help their employees build resilience and find balance.

The immediate crisis of the pandemic has receded. But for many workers, the risk of burnout has never been higher.

In a recent report, 62% of women and 57% of men reported at least moderate levels of burnout. Those rates are much higher than what was reported in 2021, and are on par with levels reported at the height of the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020.

What’s causing the rise? Layoff anxiety, coupled with new pressure from management around profits and productivity, has workers doing more with less.

To combat the rising tide of burnout, many leaders are doubling down on resilience, pushing for mindfulness practices and psychological safety. Crucially, great workplaces understand that burnout isn’t something that an individual employee can control.

Root causes of burnout — overwork, a lack of autonomy, or a lack of community — are problems that must be addressed by the organization.

“Employers need to create a true culture of acceptance surrounding mental health and make it safe for employees to talk about it in the workplace,” says Tina Thornton, AVP, well-being and safety at Nationwide.

The insurance firm cites research from UKG: For 69% of people, a manager has more impact on their mental health than a doctor or therapist.

Employers have an outsized impact on the mental health of their workers, and burnout can have a disastrous impact on retention, productivity, and the bottom line.

Signs of employee burnout

When Great Place To Work® analyzes employee surveys, results show a few key indicators that workers are experiencing burnout:

1. Employees don’t trust management. Employees experiencing burnout are three times less likely to say leaders’ actions match their words.

2. Employees say they are micromanaged. Employees with burnout are three times more likely to say they are micromanaged in experience surveys.

3. Employees say they aren’t informed about the business. Employees feeling a lack of control over their work often express it as feeling like they lack important information. Workers with burnout are 2.5 times less likely to say they are kept in the loop with important updates about the business.

4. Employees don’t see their workplace as fair. Employees experiencing burnout were much more likely to respond to the question “What would make this a better place to work?” with phrases like:

“fear of retaliation”
“discrimination”
“remove favoritism”

Taking action against burnout

Here are some of the strategies that are having the best results for improving employee well-being and reducing burnout:

1. Train managers

An employee’s direct supervisor has an extraordinary impact on the well-being of the worker. That’s why many companies are focused on training their leaders to identify burnout and intervene.

“The top way to prevent burnout from my perspective is first to ensure you have strong, well-trained managers that focus on engaging and supporting their team members,” says Anna Avalos, chief people officer at SoFi Technologies.

“Employers need to create a true culture of acceptance surrounding mental health and make it safe for employees to talk about it in the workplace." - Tina Thornton, AVP, well-being and safety, Nationwide

Managers can prevent burnout by connecting employees to tools to manage stress, reassigning projects to ensure employees have a balanced workload, and providing coaching on how to prioritize tasks.

At Nationwide, leaders are encouraged to connect with employees in huddles and one-on-ones to identify when burnout might be starting. A crucial question to ask in these meetings: “How can I support you?”

2. Measure outcomes — not time spent

When you change how you manage your workforce, such as rewarding employees for completed projects rather than hours logged, workers can find a better balance.

“When business needs allow, providing employees flexibility can produce better work and a happier, more engaged workforce,” says Chrissy Kendrick, vice president, human resources with Shields Health Solutions. “By measuring outcomes, we can continue to drive the business forward, focusing on results, not the time spent to get there.”

3. Provide employees with tools to set boundaries

At Ryan, a global tax services and software provider, leaders help team members craft messages for clients when they close their office for a weeklong break in July. Clients are alerted well in advance of the week off and respect the company’s decision to take a break.

The example stands out in how leaders are ensuring their workers are able to unplug from demanding, client-facing roles. Without the extra communication to reset expectations for both team members and clients, an attempt to give all employees a week off wouldn’t be as successful.

4. Lean on resource groups

Social connection is a key ingredient in building resilience for employees. For many companies, supporting relationships across the organization is done through employee resource groups.

“Twenty-five percent of our team members are part of our mental health and wellness employee resource group, EMPOWER,” says Charlene Naumann, VP, talent at Shields Health Solutions. “This has been instrumental in creating a supportive, inclusive, and safe environment for everyone.”

5. Reset expectations about post-crisis recovery

The pandemic offered plenty of lessons about the causes of burnout, particularly in the field of health care. One dynamic that stood out: Employees pushed past their limits to meet a crisis with an expectation of recovery time that never materialized.

Psychologists at Scripps Health say that many in health care burned through their reserves with the expectation they would be able to stop and “fill up their tanks” at a later date.

Instead, the experts at Scripps recommend different coping strategies: “We never know what is on the other side of a major stressor, or if there will be time to stop and recharge, which is why having a preventative approach to mental health can be so important. Practice the coping and strategies before the crisis and stressor hits so we have the skills in place to navigate it without depleting ourselves.”

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5 Workplace Well-Being Lessons From Toddlers

2024-03-11T07:02:02-04:00

Employees in the workplace could learn a thing or two from their youngest family members.

By Ted Kitterman

When Dr. Hasan Merali explained that my toddler has more well-being than me, my first reaction was to laugh.

My 16-month-old son is a walking petri dish that brings home superbugs from daycare. Exhibit A: The pink eye and double ear infection he has this very week.

What well-being tips could I possibly learn from someone who can’t even wipe his own nose?

Quite a few, according to Merali, a pediatric emergency medicine physician and researcher who has been working with toddlers for more than a decade. In his new book, “Sleep Well, Take Risks, Squish the Peas,” Merali makes the case that toddlers have innate knowledge and habits that lead to resilience and overall wellness.

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“These are all things that we used to know,” Dr. Merali says. “Because of age and our experiences, some of these things have got a little bit lost along the way. But we have the ability to get them back.”

A workplace well-being crisis

Now might be a good time to look for unconventional sources of information to address the well-being crisis sweeping the modern workplace.

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many employers increased support and programs for mental health, invested in technology and training to build resilience, and launched new offerings to improve well-being for employees. Despite the increase in focus, Great Place To Work® research has found that mental and emotional well-being hasn’t improved much for employees at the typical U.S. workplace.

The U.S. Surgeon General issued a public health advisory in 2023 about the impact of loneliness and isolation on all Americans, including employees. Well-being continues to be a top priority for HR leaders, and a key driver of employee retention.

Equity of well-being is also one of the Four Equities, a framework developed by Great Place To Work to determine the experiences that create a workplace culture that builds equity and belonging for all employees.

Toddler-like well-being

What lessons can we learn from toddlers about well-being and the workplace? Several, Dr. Merali says.

“Toddlers work extremely hard every day,” he says. Daycare opens at 7 a.m. and lasts until 6 p.m., with toddlers going through a rapid learning curve. Yet, toddlers have a much healthier “workplace.”

They get scheduled breaks, usually going outdoors to play, eat meals with friends, and take naps. By contrast, many working adults eat at their desk or skip their lunch, stay inside, and remain seated at their desk for hours at a time.

Nap time? Forget it.

But adults could also benefit from some structured breaks during the day. “Even just a short walk or something else to get away from the screen and up and moving is incredibly helpful,” Dr. Merali says.

That’s not the only way two-year-olds find more well-being. Here are the well-being lessons grown-ups should take from this impressive age group:

1. Be a team player

Toddlers are natural collaborators, Dr. Merali says. “Teamwork is critical for toddlers because they are focused on building relationships and learning, and that really comes out when they’re working with others.”

Your toddler might be a better communicator than you, Dr. Merali adds.

In a study where a toddler is paired with an adult to complete a task, and then the adult is asked by the researcher to stop doing the task, the toddler will immediately take up the issue with the adult.

“They’ll address the adult, politely, and they’ll just explain what needs to be done in their own language, a couple of words,” Dr. Merali says. If that doesn’t work, they go to the next step and just show their partner what needs to be done.

“They just want to make sure that the other person understands, and that they can work together — that’s all they really want to do,” Dr. Merali says.

The key is to approach a work partner without judgement. In other experiments, researchers have shown that toddlers don’t assign blame when a task doesn’t go according to plan.

“They are focused on getting the work done, not really about what happened,” Dr. Merali says. “They just simply acknowledge the problem, move on, and just look for solutions.”

2. Ask more questions

Building relationships is a key element of creating well-being in the workplace, with meaningful connections being one of five dimensions of well-being identified in Great Place To Work research.

One great way to build those connections? Learn to ask questions.

Toddlers are the experts at asking questions. “When toddlers are recorded and they’re not paying attention to the recording equipment, they can ask a hundred questions in an hour,” Dr. Merali says, a rate of inquiry adults cannot replicate.

“As adults we get question shy,” he explains. “We care a lot about what the other person thinks of us. We care a lot about how asking questions will make us look— so our rate of questions goes down dramatically.”

Yet, asking questions has immense benefits, not only to get information but to show humility and communicate interest in others.

3. Embrace saying “no”

Toddlers are famous for their penchant to say “no” — and while Dr. Merali doesn’t recommend completely emulating your toddler’s appetite for contrariness, there are well-being benefits to setting a clear boundary.

“카지노 커뮤니티 랭킹 default for a lot of requests that come into us is to say ‘yes,’” Dr. Merali says. To better prioritize and protect your calendar, adults could benefit from resetting their default, or at least pausing before agreeing to another project.

4. Adopt the toddler sleep schedule

“The best wellness takeaway for anyone is always to get better sleep,” Dr. Merali says — and toddlers have much healthier sleep habits than adults. “If we could follow a toddler’s sleep schedule, then our sleep would be so much better.”

The typical toddler routine starts one hour before bedtime and requires you to put away phone screens, take a warm bath or shower, do a hygiene activity (brushing teeth), and then do a quiet activity (reading a book).

That simple playbook dramatically improves sleep and has incredible benefits for the whole day.

5. Celebrate others

Great Place To Work research shows the importance of creating a culture of recognition for employee well-being. For toddlers, celebrating others is second nature.

“When I drop off my little one at preschool every day, I can’t even walk down the hall a few steps without hearing a big hooray or clapping for something that they did,” says Dr. Merali.

People trying to create great workplaces should try to emulate the joy of a two-year-old when celebrating colleagues. It might feel silly, but the research shows a little fun in the workplace goes a long way.

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How a Focus on Passion in the Workplace Can Push Employees Toward Burnout

2023-09-18T07:01:04-04:00

How you measure employee engagement can have profound consequences for well-being, according to new research.

Employees want their work to be meaningful, but can you have too much of a good thing?

Employees are two to six times more likely to stay with their organization long-term when they say their work is more than “just a job,” according to Great Place To Work® research. Meaningful work increases the likelihood that employees will have well-being.

Meaning, however, shouldn’t be mistaken for obsession with your work. Research has shown the importance of finding some distance from your work during non-work hours — what researchers call “psychological detachment.”

When employees don’t disconnect from their work, they are more likely to experience long-term fatigue symptoms. And when passion for work becomes an obsession with work, the less likely an employee is to detach and recharge.

Identifying passion in your employees

Ask any employer whether they want their workers to be passionate about their job, and the answer won’t shock anyone: Yes, they prefer passionate employees.

How they determine if someone is passionate, however, is often an impenetrable tangle of personal bias and bad science.

Heather Vough, associate professor of management at George Mason University, has new research into how a focus on passion in creative professions poses risks for employees. Through 116 interviews with 55 employees at two U.S.-based architecture firms between 2006 and 2020, Vough and her co-author Angela Ianniello discovered that managers often rely on instinct rather than science to identify passion in an employee.

“I don’t think they’re measuring anything in any sort of systematic or scientific way,” she says. In one interview, a senior manager described to her his evaluation method: “When I’m in an interview with a new employee, I could just tell if they’re passionate, I can just feel it."

“It’s facial expressions and gestures,” Vough says, “which people are reading as early as your hiring interview to assess: Are you passionate about this?”

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In her view, these imprecise evaluations beg a question: “Are people just conflating extroversion with passion?”

When not trying to assess body language, some managers can resort to other markers that encourage damaging behavior.

Vough gives examples: “I’m willing to work really long hours. I’m willing to not necessarily get paid. I’m willing to make these sacrifices.”

Some managers even claim to be able to detect passion in an employee’s work product by looking at “a building or plan that somebody draws up and tell whether they’re passionate or not.”

The road to burnout

An overemphasis on passion can open employees to exploitation, with management expecting workers to demonstrate their commitment with long-hours and tolerating poor working conditions.

It can also incentivize the performance of passion rather than its authentic presence.

“I can do all the things that make it look like I’m passionate without really being passionate,” Vough explains. Working long hours or coming in on the weekend isn’t a guarantee of improved work product; it’s a recipe for burnout.

Vough hypothesizes that these dynamics are especially acute in creative professions where it’s hard to assess creative performance.

“Instead of necessarily being able to assess an output, I think people rely maybe a little bit more on the behaviors that got to that output and that they associate those behaviors with passion,” she says.

The solution? Reward performance — not vibes.

Vough gives the example of a hiring manager who reported that he ignored accomplishments on a résumé or past work in a portfolio.

“All he wants to know is that they’re passionate,” Vough says. That’s a problem when passion is being assessed with so little objectivity.

Cultivating healthy passion

What can companies do to ensure employees have a healthy amount of passion for their work?

Vough cites the work of Robert Vallerand, who divides passion at work into two types: harmonious and obsessive.

Obsessive passion, among other characteristics, is defined as an inability to step away from work and a rigidness in how work is pursued. Harmonious passion allows for more flexibility, where inspired employees can pursue areas of interest while maintaining other relationships and entertaining competing priorities.

Employers might value the passion of an employee, but the moment they demand it or incentivize it, they open the door to negative consequences.

Instead, employers should focus on creating high-trust workplaces where they harness workers’ harmonious passion, but refrain from putting pressure on workers to demonstrate their passion at every turn. Otherwise, you risk pushing talented, committed employees out of the organization — or even the industry.

“I had one architect in the first firm that I studied, who looked around at everybody and said, ‘They’re so passionate. I just wish I had that. I don’t have that.’” Vough shares. “And he was thinking about leaving architecture despite finishing school and everything because he just didn’t feel like he had the passion everybody did.”

In Vough’s opinion, those kinds of stories represent a loss for employers.

“That’s a pity to lose a very competent person because they look around and everybody’s doing this performance of passion,” she says.

Her advice: “Have more objective criteria.” Passion is a great thing for a workplace — but it’s not the only thing.

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Deloitte's Jen Fisher on Workplace Burnout, Mental Health, and Loneliness

2023-05-15T12:53:03-04:00

“If you employ human beings, you have to care for their well-being. It's not a nice to have, it’s not a good to have, it's nonnegotiable. It is a baseline requirement for today's workforce.”

On this episode of the Better podcast, Jen Fisher, chief well-being officer at Deloitte, shares her burnout experience, signs she ignored, and the impact workplace friendships and in-person connection have on our mental health, productivity, and retention.

She talks about the No. 1 thing you should do before starting any well-being program, and how to combat loneliness some remote workers might experience.

On her experience with burnout:

I processed many of the symptoms of employee burnout as failure. I had the mindset of, “I'm just going to push through. I'll rest on the weekend. I'll take a vacation when the project's over. Then things will get better ‘when.’”

I had not been engaging in work or life and in any meaningful way. I didn't have any motivation. I was exhausted all the time. My emotions were all over the place, either really high or really low.

My personal relationships suffered. I didn't make time for them. I didn't value or prioritize them the way that I should.

So my body and brain said, “Okay, you're not going to do something about it, so we're going to make it so bad for you that you have no choice.” And that's really what happened. I was forced to take a step back and take time off from work, and address burnout and the struggles that I was having with my mental health.

That personal journey and personal discovery led me down the path of saying, “I want to help others not get to where I got.”

On where to start when creating wellness programs:

The No. 1 and lowest cost thing that you can do — because there's no cost to it other than engaging with people and getting a little bit of their time — is asking your workforce, “Hey, what do you want? What do you need? What would be meaningful? What are the barriers in the way of you doing these things for yourself, or taking advantage of the things that the organization is providing you?”

As leaders, understanding what those barriers are, you can then decide if that’s a barrier you can remove. And if you can't, are there ways around it? Are there things you can do to overcome it?

It's really powerful to engage your workforce in this type of conversation, because even if you don't do exactly what they ask you to do, the simple fact that you asked them what they thought and what they needed goes a long way.

On the challenges of remote work on our mental health:

I personally believe that there is, and will always be, a need for human beings to come together in the workplace, in person, in real life. We need to engage in conversation and work and fun — and all of those things in the workplace— with other human beings in real life. Then when we're remote, we then have a stronger connection with those people.

People go to the office to have their human needs met, and the biggest of those human needs is human connection. Can it be done in a digital environment? It can, but it can be accelerated and done better when there is also in-person time.

I'm not going to prescribe what that looks like for every organization, but with remote work, there are positives and negatives. We know that fully remote work has exacerbated the loneliness crisis. Digital connection is connection, but it's not human connection.

On the importance of friendships at work:

Unfortunately, the research shows that many people don't have a friend at work, but for those who do, they're more likely to stay with an organization. They're more engaged, their work product is better, because we are meant to connect with other human beings.

It's a sense of belonging. If I connect with another human being, I feel like I belong at the organization, and that's what we all want. We all want to know that we belong somewhere. We want to know that we're accepted. We want to know that we're seen.

And that's why you need to have at least a couple of friends at work. You don't have to like everyone, but you need a few friends.

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5 Easy Ways To Provide Emotional & Mental Health Support For Employees

2022-03-01T04:30:38-05:00

Curbing Workplace Burnout in Young Mothers of Color

2022-01-05T17:54:02-05:00

Young mothers of color are at the highest risk of experiencing burnout, and it’s high time that leaders lean in, listen closely, and help where they can.

This year, Great Place To Work conducted the largest-ever study of working parents to understand their workplace experience, the unique challenges they face and how leaders can support them.

Working Parents, Burnout and the Great Resignation provides data and insights to help organizations better leverage the experiences of their working parents and create great workplaces For All™.

카지노 커뮤니티 랭킹 2021 report revealed that while “pandemic burnout” is still impacting the well-being of working parents, Best Workplaces™ have managed to increase their level of care for parents in the workplace, leading to higher retention among working parents.

The COVID-19 pandemic has certainly reshaped the way we view work. It has also led to heightened awareness of how structural racism impacts people of color, even in the workplace. Leaders from Best Workplaces have innovated to create more inclusive environments where employees can thrive, not despite their differences, but because of them.

For example, Best Workplaces began to create discussion forums for people of color to express their concerns and grievances to their leaders. Many of these companies have also created dedicated functions within their organization for combating workplace discrimination – something that might have been left up to the discretion of the individual a few years ago.

Mothers of color, however, are still facing unique challenges as working parents and their double minority status makes finding and asserting their voices in hopes of achieving structural change that much harder.

Young mothers of color in particular – between the ages of 24 to 34 – are even more susceptible to experiencing burnout than their White, male counterparts, and the pandemic has affected them disproportionately.

Here’s how you can help them defeat burnout:

Perfect your intersectional approach

Being a double minority myself, I know with some level of certainty that the intersections of my identity – as a Black Woman – act as fertile ground for sexism and racism alike.

Organizations often make the mistake of focusing on “categories” of gender or race and ethnicity and fail to recognize that the whole person is far more complex than a box on a survey.

An intersectional approach to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) is honoring the multiplicity of who we are as people.

Mothers of color are also diverse, and so are their needs, which vary based on their economic status, family structure, gender identity, and more.

Ensure pay parity for mothers of color

According to the National Fund of Workforce Solutions, median wages are higher for White workers with a high school diploma and no college ($19/hour) than for Black workers with an associate’s degree ($18/hour). Racial inequities in income already cost the U.S. economy about $2.3 trillion per year.

Many mothers of color act as the sole bread winner for their family and without intentional pay parity, they continue to stand at the fault line of society, failing to get ahead. Fair pay provides more for childcare expenses, resources for coping with the stresses of parenthood, and a heightened sense of belonging in the workplace.

The toll of racial inequalities in income will grow as the U.S. workforce becomes increasingly diverse. Pay parity for working mothers of color will serve the greater good and create a future where fair pay is not a “nice-to-have”, but an expectation.

Raise your awareness of inequities that exist outside of work for mothers of color

Decades of research suggest that mothers of color are more likely to be responsible for all childcare responsibilities and housework than White mothers are. In fact, Black mothers are more than twice as likely as White mothers to be managing these duties for their family.

This is not a new problem. Sociologist Anna Julia Cooper writes about women of color as wage-earners in the late 1800s, explaining that most of the productive labor of the world is in fact done by women, and that their unpaid labor is what makes for a productive society.

Cooper’s work holds true today, and I think we all understand that the labor done within today’s household has a great impact on labor outside the household.

Young mothers of color – many of them hourly wage earners – are often working long hours, day and night, to support their families. Pay parity can begin to lessen the burden. And Latinx, Black, and Asian mothers are also more likely to stay at a job when they have access to reliable childcare.

It’s clear that mothers of color need allyship more than ever before. They need their fellow employees and their leaders to stand up for what’s right and advocate for more inclusive workplace cultures, and benefits that better serve them.

Better workplaces for mothers of color means better workplaces for all

When you target mothers of color in your DEIB efforts, everyone within the organization will benefit. Supporting parents of color cannot be separate from you overall DEIB strategy. Instead, leaders can use the collective voice of their mothers of color – who are reporting higher rates of burnout than their counterparts – to foster workplaces that support equity and belong for all.

Learn more about how to support working parents, read our full report

Working Parents, Burnout & the Great Resignation. 490K+ working parents have spoken. Here are 5 keys to attracting, retaining, and sustaining them.

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Working Parents, Burnout & the Great Resignation

2021-12-10T09:32:01-05:00

As we being to recover from the parenting crisis of 2020 and children return to in-person learning, the best organizations are still doing all they can to care for their working parents. This year's Best Workplaces for Parents™ are leading the way in breaking-through parental burnout.

Founder and CEO of Maven Clinic, Kate Ryder, and Great Place To Work's VP of Data Science & Innovation, Marcus Erb, join for a covnersation about what parents are still experience in the workplace, and how increasing the standard of care for all pareents helps both your employees and your bottom line.

In this 45-minute session, you'll learn:

How to break-through parental burnout and retain working parents
What a half a million working parents have to say about how their organizations are meeting their needs and helping them thrive
How the BEst Workplaces for Parents™ are combatting the Great Resignation by creating high-trust, equitable workplaces For All™

Want more insights? Download our 10-page report

Working Parents, Burnout & the Great Resignation

2021-11-04T11:37:29-04:00

Health Care Workers & Burnout: 3 Strategies From the Best Health Care Workplaces

2021-03-12T10:05:11-05:00

Great Place To Work® research points to three keys for supporting health care workers: Preserve and reimagine jobs amid crisis Make gathering employee feedback a ritual Provide resources for employee well-being