Workplace wellness for parents is employers' biggest opportunity in 2024

A seismic shift is underway in the workforce.

Employers are moving their workforces back into the hallowed halls of the office — with 60% of people back in the office five days a week. Some employees are thrilled, others are resisting, but they all have one thing in common: today's employees are working with a new set of expectations. As employers enter benefit renewal season and plan for the next year, now is the time to consider what employees want most in 2024. 

Yesterday's workplace 'wellness'
In previous years, workplace wellness efforts were focused on the body. Perks targeted physical well-being but stopped short of considering employees' mental wellness in any meaningful way. Gym memberships, ping pong tables, and healthy vending machine snacks were the calling cards of the movement.

But, the work-from-home days of the last few years opened people's eyes to a broader understanding of wellness that is guiding their choices today. As many people — myself included — began to acknowledge the enormous stresses of managing self, work, and family simultaneously, employees' definition of 'wellness' grew to include emotional well-being, not just physical. Today's employees are no longer willing to opt into work situations that add pressure instead of relieving it. 

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What employees want in 2024
Today's employees are ready to work hard, but only if their whole selves are respected. If today's companies want to bring more people back to the office and keep their current employees happy, they must begin to prioritize holistic employee wellness, introducing policies, perks, and programs that support the full spectrum of employees' needs. 

Employees today want to be understood as people first and labor second. The savvy employer must develop workplace programs that give workers what they need to succeed inside the office and what they need to make life outside the office work. This is especially true for working parents.   

Support for working mothers offers the biggest opportunity
More than any other demographic, it is the working parents who are speaking out about stress and demanding change now before they agree to return to the rat race. Employers who want to lure workers back to the office need to start focusing more on benefits that prioritize family. 

Working women specifically are where employers should begin. Huge gender gaps in employment rates between mothers and fathers persist. Even now, having minor children at home disproportionately depresses women's employment prospects. And, in 2022, women were five to eight times more likely than men to have their employment impacted by caregiving responsibilities.

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Real support means real solutions
Employers who take the time to understand and address working mothers' true needs, will come out on top in this next phase of work. Typical wellness solutions like childcare stipends, on-site childcare services, and flexible work arrangements must be only the beginning. Companies that dig deeper and offer real wellness solutions to help working moms from the moment they announce pregnancies all the way through tuition payments for college are the companies that are going to stand out.

As a mom of four, I know personally how difficult it can be to be a working parent. When I had my first child, the single most inconvenient, stressful, and time-consuming part of my workday was breast pumping in the office — a challenge my employers never really considered. 

I eventually built my own company, MilkMate, to help employers support their nursing employees. We provide modular nursing room furniture and multi-user high performance breast pumps for employers, with pre-sterilized and pre-assembled single-use recyclable parts, so employers can help their working moms save time, energy, hassle and worry, and be more effective at work. Thoughtful, innovative benefits like MilkMate that solve real-life problems must become the norm, not the exception. 

Opportunity is knocking
There has been much discussion about how to entice workers to come back to the office. From the Harvard Business Review suggesting companies focus on the social element of office life to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce encouraging hybrid work as the solution. But, according to a Zippia report, 87% of workers consider health and wellness benefits and incentives when choosing employers and nearly 50% of working parents report turning down a job offer because it wouldn't work for their families. As benefits become a bigger and bigger differentiator for employees, the companies who step up will rise up. 

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Employers can and must make the transition back to the office easier for all their employees, but working moms should come first. Pregnancy support groups. Working mother mentor programs. Fully equipped nursing rooms. Extended paid parental leave. Transition back to work programs. College savings plans. There is so much more employers can be doing. 

And this doesn't even scratch the surface when it comes to supporting moms doing non- office-based work such as hospitality, government, manufacturing, hospitals, education, etc. Hybrid working arrangements are not realistic in many of these industries, so employers will have to go even further to support the parents in the midst.

Products, programs, and policies that support working moms will ultimately benefit all employees — and employers. Businesses will reap rewards like increased productivity, lower absenteeism, higher job satisfaction, lower turnover and burnout and a leg up in the hiring game. Supporting holistic wellness for working mothers is not only good business, it's smart business.

Employers who lean into the holistic wellness trend and offer the most thoughtful, family-focused solutions will get the biggest bang for their buck in the next wave of work. It's time for companies to make the life of the working parent work. The rest will follow.