How to keep high-fliers after maternity leave - Building Gender Balanced Business

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• Women should be empowered to manage their own maternity cover arrangements

• Women must plan and communicate an effective handover plan that coincides with their long-term work goals

• Women should be encouraged to think in advance about their return and to make a business case for how they may want to work on their return

• Employers must be open to requests for flexible working (women express high levels of loyalty to employers who are open to flexible and creative ways of working at senior levels)

• A good, open working relationship with the line manager must be established. This has emerged as a significant factor in retaining top women

• Regular performance reviews must be established following the return to work. These are extremely important in enabling women to feel re-engaged and assured that their feet are firmly back on the career ladder.

Many companies have identified that the failure to retain women following maternity is affecting both their efficiency and their profitability, and recent academic research points to evidence that women are still exiting unnecessarily.

It is important, therefore, for managers to understand why this might happen and to avail themselves of tips on how they can retain women who are trying to manage a new family and continue working.

Over the past three years, maternity coaching — a technique we believe was pioneered at the Executive Coaching Consultancy (ECC) — has been increasingly employed by top companies as part of their strategy to ensure that they keep their senior women.

Having a child is a major transition that affects both the personal and professional lives of women — and has the potential to derail women professionally.

“A particularly important aspect of maternity coaching is the opportunity to challenge many assumptions that the individual may have about both their own ability to work flexibly and the willingness of their employer to enable them to work flexibly, especially where no precedence exists.”

ECC started developing a maternity coaching programme in 2005. It typically consisted of three or four sessions before, during and after maternity leave.

Coaches can offer women some thinking space to re-adjust to the dual challenge of work and parenthood. The sessions following the return to work frequently focussed on career development goals.

Three years on, maternity coaching has become accepted and acknowledged as a constructive intervention during a critical period for professional women.

A particularly important aspect of maternity coaching is the opportunity to challenge many assumptions that the individual may have about both their own ability to work flexibly and the willingness of their employer to enable them to work flexibly, especially where no precedence exists.

“Having a baby is a momentous and life-changing experience. Both starting and returning from maternity leave are very stressful,” said Herbert Smith’s Head of Diversity and Inclusion, Carolyn Lee. “Maternity coaching is one way we can provide support at this time.”

ECC encouraged research into this area, and the resulting study will be published in the International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching and Mentoring Practice in November 2008. I interviewed senior professional women about their experience of returning to work in high-flying roles, where half of the participants had taken part in maternity coaching. I also looked at the factors that influenced the women to leave highly-paid roles at the height of very successful careers.

The participants included women from a variety of sectors including publishers, management consultants and lawyers from a leading law firm, Herbert Smith, where they had launched maternity coaching with their senior women in 2006.

“Having a baby is a momentous and life-changing experience. Both starting and returning from maternity leave are very stressful,” said Herbert Smith’s Head of Diversity and Inclusion, Carolyn Lee. “Maternity coaching is one way we can provide support at this time.”

“There was a close correlation between the quality of the women’s relationship with their line manager and their commitment to their role.”

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE RELATIONSHIP WITH THE LINE MANAGER

• There was a close correlation between the quality of the women’s relationship with their line manager and their commitment to their role. Where line managers were open and clear communicators, women exhibited a significantly higher degree of commitment.

DESIRE TO FOCUS ON CAREER DEVELOPMENT

• At a point when employers may be concerned at not overly taxing their employees, women clearly communicated a strong desire to be able to see a clear career path on their return to work. “I had all this energy and drive and wanted to channel it into something positive,” said a coachee from Herbert Smith.

WORK FLEXIBILITY INSPIRES LOYALTY

• The research showed that where employers responded to the need for flexibility at senior levels, women exhibited very high levels of loyalty and commitment to the employer, choosing to stay where their talent was recognised. Where employers ‘get it right’ during the middle period of women’s careers, this can pay dividends in the long term, enabling employers to keep their top talent through to board and partner level.

“The research showed that where employers responded to the need for flexibility at senior levels, women exhibited very high levels of loyalty and commitment to the employer.”

CRUNCH POINT OCCURS 12-24 MONTHS AFTER THEIR RETURN

• Employers believe that the critical time for women deciding to return or not to return is during maternity leave. The reality is that women are highly motivated to return but the crunch point comes 12-24 months following their return and the role they are returning to falls far short of their expectations and desire for challenge, and/or working patterns are completely inflexible.

It is at this time that they are often experiencing some of the toughest moments in making the transition back to work such as the loss of a nanny or the lack of a clear career path – all of which may combine to prompt a decision to opt out.

The sustained effort of juggling career and family can come into serious question when the twin worlds of work and home collide, especially if the woman feels sidelined professionally.

Bussell, J. (2008) Great Expectations: Can Maternity Coaching affect the Retention of Professional Women? International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching and Mentoring, Special Issue No. 2, Autumn 2008.