BUSINESS

SCHOOL

Who cares? Employer and employee

responses to employee eldercare

responsibilities

Alexandra HeronWomen & Work Research Group University of Sydney Business School

Keynote Address to NSW Carers Association Conference on 22 May 2015

The presentation will cover

1. The extent of informal eldercare

2. Why it is a growing issue

3. What work rights employee-eldercarers have &

what they may need

4. Research on eldercare – Women & Work

Research Group, University of Sydney

5. Some few ideas about change.

Work + adult care: some statistics

2012 ABS - Disability, Ageing and Carers Survey (ABS

2013)

› 12% of entire population involved in caring for adults

45-64 age group – those caring

› 23% of women + 16% men involved in caring

2014 Australian Work and Life Index: employees (Skinner

& Pocock 2014)

45-64 age group – support help or care to older person

› 30% of women & 26%

2012-2015 Two large employers: 18-28% employee-eldercarers

3

Public policy dilemmas

› Women’s increasing labour force participation esp in older age groups

(ABS 2015)

AND

› Ageing of the population

A need for more informal care

A need for more workers (Page et al 2009)

4

Age Group 1990 2015

45-54 43% 63%

55-64 23% 56%

Workplace arrangements which have been found to be useful for employee-eldercarers

› Counselling provided through workplace EAP schemes

› Eldercare resource and referral systems

› Help with eldercare planning

› Financial assistance with care costs, workplace e’care facility

› Flexible work arrangements, leave programs (US: Dembe et

al 2011)

› Access to better & cheaper support services

› More flexible working, ability to reduce hours, to take blocks of

leave, working from home

› Increased employer awareness of the issue (Australia: TOCC

2007)

5

Carers’ statutory workplace entitlements

A right to request flexible work – to provide personal care, support and

assistance to someone who is frail and aged or has a disability

› 12 months service/regular casuals

› Request to be in writing

› Can be turned down on reasonable business grounds w/in 21 days

› No external appeal possible in most cases

Carers’ leave

› 10 days pa paid personal leave: accumulates (with same employer) and

available as carer’s leave

› To provide care or support to family/household member who needed that

due to illness, injury or an emergency

(Fair Work Act 2009)

6

Exploratory research with 2 large employers on employee eldercare needs (Baird & Heron 2013)

1 private employer (Co1), 1 public employer (PS1)

8 employees from each organisation & 1 HRM in each, 2 nine managers in one

› 11 women, 5 men eldercarers (or recently so)

› 3 were NESB

› Aged 23-60: in Co1 mainly in 40s, in PS 1 in 50s

› Varied educational background but largely in professional/managerial/supervisory roles

› Nearly all viewed themselves as primary carers

› CRs lived in their own home (8), in aged care (6), or with CG (2)

What care was provided?

› Main types of care: administrative; management of health care issues; emotional and social support; occasional household tasks

› None provided personal care such as washing and dressing, even where care giver (CG) & care recipient (CR) lived together (2/3)

› ‘Remote’ care: 4 (had) cared from a distance (PS 1)

› Most spent up to 10 hours pw, often less but involvement felt high to CGs

› Transition from independent living from the point of high stress/time commitment

What accommodations were used?

› Telephone calls: either use of worktime &/or work

phone – monitoring and admin

› Paid carer’s leave

› Informal hours adjustments for more senior staff,

work made up later

› Blocks of unpaid/paid leave of up to 6 months (2

each in Co1 & PS1 )

› PS 1: formal flexitime for less senior staff

9

Employees’ responses to employer assistance

Most employees were positive/reasonably so; a few

were lukewarm/critical – but a lot of guilt as these

quotes form interviews show:

› ‘didn’t want to take time off because I felt like [I] was

letting my job down as well. So of course you try to

do everything you possibly can, you try to fit

everybody in’

› ’the most, traumatic day for me ever... I probably

should have taken time off, but I didn't because the

nature of my job doesn't allow that. There is no, I

mean [work commitments] don't wait’

What would have helped?

1. Increased access to reduced hours incl temporarily ‘That would have been fantastic, now that I look back on it… It would have just been really good to have found an extra day a week [for three months]’

2. More access to accumulated paid carer’s leave

3. Blocks of unpaid leave

4. Workload adjustments

5. Provision of information about finding aged care

6. Counselling/employee interest groups

7. Positive organisational culture

8. Colleagues’ attitudes

Employees’ views of their line managers

›All viewed line managers’ attitudes as critical

to accessing accommodations, one said:

‘I think it’s just the types of managers that I’ve

worked through while this has happened. Like, I

had managers previously where I don’t think I

would have been confronted with the amount of

pushback that I have been, recently, on this.’

The role of line managers: issues emerging from the above & other research

›Managerial discretion (Kelly & Kalev 2006)

› Is accommodating care a reward to the

‘deserving’ employee? (Yeandle et al 2003)

›Are demands on line managers when

facilitating eldercare recognised? (Earl and

Taylor 2015)

›How do the other demands on a line manager

interact with their response to an employee’s

eldercare duties? (Todd & Binns 2013)

Conclusions

› Elder care needs differ from childcare needs in a

number of respects

› Access to flexible working and various forms of leave

is very important for employees undertaking

eldercare

› Being able to access well understood & publicised

entitlements appears to assist employees

› Line managers are at the ‘frontier of control’ over

flexibility

› Erratic application of policies can undermine their

value esp with regard to keeping careers on track

Further policy responses needed?

› A right to flexible/part-time work except in exceptional

circumstances AND a cheap speedy way of resolving

employer/employee disagreements

› New rights for eldercarers? (HREOC 2008)

Right to unpaid leave similar to unpaid parental leave

Dedicated carers leave

› Implications of consumer directed care & HACC changes for

informal carers

› Should there be more Government financial assistance for

employers of carers?

References

› Australian Bureau of Statistics 2013, Survey of Disability, Ageing and Carers, Australia 2012, Cat. No. 4430.0.

› Australian Bureau of Statistics 2015, Labour Force, Australia, Detailed - Electronic Delivery, Cat. No. 6291.0.

› Baird, M & Heron, A 2013, ‘Women, Work and Eldercare’, in P Smyth & J Buchanan (eds.), Inclusive Growth in Australia:

Social policy as economic investment, Crows Nest, NSW.

› Dembe, AE, Partridge, JS, Dugan, E & Piktialis, DS 2011, ‘Employees’ satisfaction with the employer-sponsored elder-care

programs’, International Journal of Workplace Health Management,vol.4, no. 3, pp.216-227.

› Earl, C & Taylor, P 2015, ‘Is Workplace Flexibility Good Policy? Evaluating the Efficacy of Age Management Strategies for

Older Women Workers,’ Work, Aging and Retirement, online publication 6 January 2015.

› Kelly, E & Kalev, A 2006, ‘Managing flexible work arrangements in US organizations: formalized discretion or ‘a right to ask’,’

Socio-Economic Review , vol. 4, no.3, pp. 379-416.

› Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission 2008, It’s About Time: Women, Men, Work and Family, Human Rights

and Equal Opportunities Commission, Sydney.

› Page, A, Baird, M, Heron, A & Whelan, J 2009, Taking Care: Mature Age Workers with Eldercare Responsibilities, NSW

Industrial Relations/University of Sydney, Sydney, viewed 9 November 2013,

http://sydney.edu.au/business/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/107967/Mature_Aged_Carers_Report_Oct09.pdf

› Skinner, N & Pocock, B 2014, The Australian Work and Life Index 2014: The Persistent Challenge - Living, Working and

Caring in Australia in 2014, Centre for Work + Life, UNISA, Adelaide.

› Taskforce on Care Costs (TOCC) 2007, The hidden face of care: Combining work and caring responsibilities for the aged

and people with a disability, viewed on 20 September 2013, http://tinyurl.com/nc4lt5w

› Todd, P & Binns, J 2013, ‘Work–life balance: Is it now a problem for management?,’ Gender, Work and Organization, vol.

20, no. 3, pp. 219–231.

› Yeandle, S, Phillips, J, Scheibl, F, Wigfield, A & Wise, S 2003, Line managers and family-friendly employment, Joseph

Rowntree Foundation, York, UK. 16