In March 2025, the national charity ‘Working Families’ launched its ‘Family Friendly Workplace’ certification in partnership with ‘Parents at Work’. It aimed to support employee well-being, workplace inclusivity, and more. The overall mission was to encourage employers to enhance their employees’ work-life balance through well-researched framework and improving upon what they excel in.
What have Working Families done?
This certification is the latest milestone in Working Families’ mission. They want to break down workplace barriers that people with caring responsibilities face at work. From offering free legal advice to parents and carers to helping employers foster a more nurturing working environment, they help a large number of people.
They’re highly experienced in the field of helping parents and carers, which is abundantly clear when you see the framework they have created in the Family Friendly Workplace Certification UK.
What is the certification about?
Initially developed by Parents At Work, it was launched in Australia to help dedicated employers who want their organisations to adopt best-practice, family-inclusive policies.
Four years after its initial launch, it has been rolled out in the UK, providing British businesses with the framework to create an inclusive and productive working environment.
What changes are encouraged?
Parent and Carer benefits
One of the significant changes the scheme encourages is for employed parents and caregivers to receive flexible working benefits, enhancing their work-life balance. However, this goes further than the standard flexible working benefits most workers receive. Adjusted start and finish times, alongside “microflex” breaks, can give parents the option to start their workday earlier, meaning they can pick up their kids when they finish school at 3.
Parental/carer leave policies may be offered in some workplaces (varies by employer). This means parents would receive increased leave periods, alongside the option for fully paid leave to support families further. This can be given for several reasons, including pregnancy loss, fertility treatment and newborn care. However, these benefits are not universally mandated and depend on individual employer policies.
Additionally, parents and carers may receive protection from certain types of discrimination, including unfair dismissal during parental or carer leave, maternity leave, and more.
Employers are beginning to understand the burden that childcare costs can have on their workforce. This is why more businesses are looking into on-site childcare services as a benefit for parents in the workforce. By providing for parents’ needs in this way, they can ensure that their employees’ needs are accommodated, leading to increased productivity from workers.
While some employers offer childcare support or subsidies, this is not yet a widespread practice across all workplaces.” (The prevalence of such benefits varies and is more common in larger or more progressive organisations).
Leaders
The certification framework includes guidance for leaders to foster a supportive environment for parents and carers, emphasising the importance of understanding employees’ needs and promoting the use of family-friendly policies. This way, they can actively make the effort to create a working environment that truly benefits parents and carers. Managers and leaders should encourage their team to utilise the Family Friendly policies. Employees should be comfortable using them, and not made to feel like additional leave and pay is a “burden” on the company.
By recognising the long-term responsibilities of parents and carers, the working environment can become a more positive ecosystem, where small road bumps caused by external factors can be accounted for, keeping operations running smoothly.
We can help!
If you’re interested in changing your business framework to benefit people in parental or carer roles, we can help you roll it out smoothly. We understand it may feel like a big step. Still, with support and guidance from our team of HR experts, you can transform your business into an inclusive and supportive workplace, fully in line with the certification’s framework. We’ll guide you through every stage of the process and leave a lasting positive impact on your team.