Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
    • Advertise
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • XpertHR
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Pricing
    • Free trial
    • Subscribe
    • XpertHR USA
  • Webinars
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
    • Advertise
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • XpertHR
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Pricing
    • Free trial
    • Subscribe
    • XpertHR USA
  • Webinars
  • OHW+

Employment lawMaternity

Exploding the myth of the “problem with working women and babies”

by Personnel Today 7 Oct 2009
by Personnel Today 7 Oct 2009

Two mothers from the same company welcoming two new babies into the world at the same time is usually seen as some kind of “nightmare scenario” for a small business. All that “EU legislation” regarding maternity rights is often blamed for making “women of a child bearing age effectively unemployable”.

However when Laura MacDonald and Pippa Schofield, two of the twenty strong team at HR services firm Direct Law and Personnel announced their pregnancy, MD Judith Fiddler was delighted for them. Laura gave birth to Coby on 8th July and Pippa welcomed Lexi on the 9th September.

Judith should know better than most about personnel rights and procedures, given that HR is her area of expertise, but despite this she has seen no disruption at all to her business.

Judith comments “we hear a lot about small businesses being unwilling to employ women who may be planning to have a family because of the negative impact their absence can have on their business. In reality, many new parents have very different wishes for how they want to arrange their work and private life at a time like this. If the employer works flexibly with them and uses the technology that is available, then there is no need for any significant difficulties to arise that may impact the business.”

“In our case both Pippa and Laura chose a flexible work pattern that suited them and everything has continued to run extremely well. Pippa chose to carry on working and was actually working the day before she gave birth. She then opted to do much of her accounting work from home. Laura took maternity leave from June 19th but has been in almost every week since mid July. She will be full time again by the end of the year.”

DLP are happy to offer advice to any employers on how to successfully implement flexible working agreements with their teams.


 

Personnel Today
Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

previous post
Carron Energy Recruitment (CER) launched as global energy manpower specialist
next post
Employees feel taken advantage of…

You may also like

Top 10 HR questions November 2023: Holiday carry-over

4 Dec 2023

Legal expert calls new holiday pay regulations ‘incoherent’

30 Nov 2023

Cruise giant accused of planning ‘fire and rehire’...

24 Nov 2023

Burges Salmon takes home 2023 Employment Law Firm...

21 Nov 2023

McDonald’s: How can employers prevent sexual harassment?

21 Nov 2023

Tesco equal pay test cases to move to...

17 Nov 2023

Minimum service levels: Work notices guidance published

16 Nov 2023

McDonald’s dismisses 18 staff following sexual harassment claims

14 Nov 2023

Unions accuse government of minimum service levels ‘red...

14 Nov 2023

UN watchdog urges action to prevent another P&O...

10 Nov 2023

  • Global growth with simple HR compliance (webinar) WEBINAR | In an increasingly global marketplace...Read more
  • Talent acquisition: How AI can complement a ‘back to basics’ approach PROMOTED | Artificial intelligence is now...Read more
  • What will it mean to be an HR professional in 2024? (webinar) WEBINAR | As we approach 2024...Read more
  • HR Budget Planning for 2024: Preparing your People Strategy PROMOTED | As organisations continue to adapt...Read more
  • Almost a fifth of UK workers feel undervalued – we need to solve this PROMOTED | A new report has found...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2023

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2023 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
    • Advertise
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • XpertHR
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Pricing
    • Free trial
    • Subscribe
    • XpertHR USA
  • Webinars
  • OHW+