Equality advances when men apply for more permits

For years, equality in the company has been promoted with career, training or mentoring programs aimed at women.

Why equality advances slowly

But progress is limited for two reasons. First, because those who make decisions —still mostly men— do not always apply fair criteria of promotion and evaluation. Second, because family care still falls almost always on women. The fact that men request fewer leaves and reduce their working hours is not anecdotal. If only part of the workforce takes on caregiving, equality in professional development suffers, even if the rules are well designed.

As we have already discussed, parity is both a right and an economic imperative, and the data still shows a ceiling that is hard to break without a fair distribution of care responsibilities.

The Vodafone case: written rules in the II Collective Agreement

The II Collective Agreement of the Vodafone Group Spain (BOE, February 9, 2021) incorporates specific measures that guarantee that requesting leaves and exercising care rights does not entail any salary or professional cost. They are not statements; they are written rules that apply to the entire workforce.

Its labor regulation includes, among others, these measures:

• Leave for birth, adoption or fostering in accordance with article 48.4 of the Workers’ Statute, applicable to both parents, with a salary supplement up to 100%.
• Right of each parent to lactation leave, with the option of concentrating it on full days or temporarily reducing the working day without loss of pay.
• Regulation of working hours, reductions and leaves of absence for caregiving with explicit guarantees: time counts towards seniority and, in certain cases, the position is reserved. This is not a minor detail: today most of these reductions and leaves of absence are requested by women.

This kind of formal commitment is what makes it possible to measure companies’ real commitment to equality, beyond the speeches.

The PwC case: real co-responsibility in parental leave

Many companies have understood that co-responsibility is not achieved with messages, but with clear internal rules. PwC is an example.

The professional services firm has eliminated the distinction between primary and secondary caregiver in its leave policy, so that both parents can take on care responsibilities on equal terms. In the United States, the firm offers 12 weeks paid for all parents and usage is close to 50%-50% between mothers and fathers, an unusual distribution, since men typically take less leave time.

PwC has also introduced measures to facilitate the return to work. In the US, after their leave, parents can rejoin by working at 60% of the workday for four weeks on full pay. In Switzerland, they can choose to work at 60% for four weeks or at 80% for eight weeks, also on full pay.

Cases like this show that reorganizing work to attract and retain talent is not just a wellbeing lever, but a key competitive strategy.

Real equity, beyond programs for women

Equity does not progress only with programs for women. It progresses when men and women can take leave and reduce working hours without it altering their professional career. In this regard, the impact of public policies on gender equality is decisive: they set the common floor on which each company builds its own rules.