Introduction:More and more companies today are experimenting with various practices intended to make them more "family-friendly." For example, offering on-site childcare and flexible work schedule options presumably makes it easier for employees with children to balance the demands of the job with the demands of parenting. This exercise will help you learn more about family-friendly business practices.
Internet Exercise:Assume that your boss, the CEO, has just read an article extolling the virtues and benefits of being a family-friendly organization and has suggested that your business should look into this. Although you know that the CEO's motives are superficial, at best, you also see this as a real opportunity to improve the quality of life for your firm's employees and truly make your business more family-friendly. Search the Internet to research family-friendly business practices.
Follow-up:Identify ten different practices that might come under the heading of being family-friendly. Finally, respond to the following instructions and questions:
- Develop arguments for and against implementing each of the ten practices you have identified.
- Rank-order the ten practices in terms of your own personal preferences for them.
- Do you think each of these practices will become more or less popular in the future? Why?
