Parental leave: a shared opportunity
Only one in ten new fathers take more than two weeks of parental leave, new research shows
19 March 2014
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New research from the Institute of Leadership & Management shows that while 96 per cent of new mothers take more than two weeks of maternity leave, less than 10 per cent of new fathers do the same.
While numbers of men taking Additional Paternity Leave remain low and caring for new children is mainly done by the female parent, organisations will struggle to achieve true diversity in senior teams.
ILM found that 63 per cent of employees feel their organisation is supportive of mothers taking up to a year’s maternity leave, but significantly fewer (58 per cent) feel their employer is supportive of fathers taking just two weeks. This is a striking imbalance, and one that is exacerbated as you rise up the ranks of management. Just 2 per cent of male managers take more than two weeks leave compared to 94 per cent of female managers, showing a great divide between the genders.
Read more about the research.