Vodafone Gives 'Best Maternity Offer, How About Others?

PRESS RELEASE: Overnight, Vodafone India has become the most coveted organisation in India to work for, especially for women. The telecom service provider has now announced a new maternity policy, one which is far more to our liking than what most other companies offer. The company now offers 16 weeks of paid maternity leave, one working week of paternity leave and 6 hours per day for 6 months post return from maternity for child care!

"The extended maternity leave and only 30-hour work week for 6 months will help returning mothers transition comfortably into the workplace and also attend to her child's nursing needs," the company said in a press release.
"The introduction of paternity leave will enable the new father bond with the baby and be around with the family during this precious family time," the release said.

In an age where most employers still prefer to hire men over women to avoid having to deal with maternity to, it is laudatory that Vodafone India has upgraded their maternity policy so well, to even include paternity leave. Many of India's 16 crore ‘unemployed' homemakers (as per latest Census data) were once working women who found it too difficult to carry on working post pregnancy because of lack of a proper support system at home and work.

"Too many talented women leave working life because they face a difficult choice between either caring for a newborn baby or maintaining their careers. Our new mandatory minimum global maternity policy will support over 1,000 Vodafone women employees every year in countries with little or no statutory maternity care," Vodafone Group Chief Executive Vittorio Colao said in the release.

Of course, there are many companies in India today that offer decent flexibility for working moms. But those are individual exceptions made by understanding bosses and HR personnel, who allow a work-from-home set-up or unpaid leave if the woman in question pleads special circumstances.

But that is still not the same as the real deal. India lags far behind when it comes to employee welfare, especially maternal benefits, as compared to all the Scandinavian countries and most of Europe and the US. And it is within our rights, as women, to expect a decent maternity policy without having to plead for it. Because if the whole fight for equal opportunities is to ever work, compensation must be factored in for biological factors, like the ability, nay, the social and family pressure to reproduce.

Data shows that while women make up anywhere between 35 to 56 per cent of the workforce depending on the geographical region and sector of employment, only three per cent or less make it to the top in positions of leadership or sitting in on the board. Simply put, it's like scaling the ladder, literally. In this case it's the corporate ladder. While men climb up quickly using both hands, women have to scale it one-handed, with a baby in one arm. And they are neither lent a hand nor given a leg up. And that's exactly what equal opportunities is about.

It is high time that other companies in India now follow in Vodafone's steps and make working conditions better for women. If social compassion, gender consciousness or a goal to move towards equal opportunities will not persuade the top brass to part with better maternal policies, then perhaps the economics of it will appeal to them.

According to Vodafone, who commissioned a global analysis from KPMG, the outcome indicates that global businesses could potentially save up to an estimated $19 billion annually through the provision of 16-weeks of fully paid maternity leave. KPMG estimated that recruiting and training new employees to replace women who do not stay in the workforce after having a baby costs global businesses $47 billion every year.

Whereas offering women 16-weeks of fully paid maternity leave rather than the statutory minimum would cost businesses an additional $28 billion a year. And if businesses were able to retain more women in the workforce after their maternity leave, they could save up to $19 billion a year and would retain the knowledge and experience of these women with positive consequences for productivity and effectiveness.

Is this factor not convincing enough for companies to give us women our due rights?