Swedish multinational automobile manufacturing company, Volvo Cars, has reportedly announced that it plans to provide paternity leave across its global workforce of 40,000, from next week. Under this new policy, the company is going to provide all its employees at least 24 weeks of parental leave irrespective of gender or location covering, 80% of their base pay.
According to the carmaker, which is owned by China’s Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., this new policy has been inspired by the parental rights that are practiced in Sweden, wherein the government compensates parents by around 80% of their pay (up to a limit) for 480 days per child.
Hakan Samuelsson, Chief executive, Volvo Cars, stated that this initiative aims at developing a culture that encourages equal parenting. Samuelsson added that when parents are supported in maintaining the balance between work and family, gender gap reduces allowing everyone to pursue their careers.
Speaking on similar lines, Hanna Fager, head of corporate functions at Volvo Cars stated that this policy will help the company attract talent and sustain its operations while the car industry is going through seismic changes. Both parents taking leave will enable the women to pursue careers equally as men.
Fager further stated that the company is trying to resolve the issues by forming highly innovative teams as the power to innovate effectively originates from diversity and inclusion.
This leave benefit apparently comes after the company carried out a pilot scheme in Europe which showcased that fathers made up over 46% of the applicants.
However, it seems to be a challenge for both lawmakers and employers that such schemes often go against the established cultural views on work and parenting. This appears to be true even in Sweden where equality is supported. Last year, fathers took only 30% of their parental leaves.
To address this situation, Volvo will reportedly introduce the leave as a pre-selected option which is expected to create a default effect as people usually stick to the choices that are presented as standard.
Source credit: https://businesstech.co.za/news/motoring/479409/volvo-cars-to-give-all-employees-six-months-paid-parental-leave/
