3 in 10 Canadian fathers would sacrifice their wages for this perk

With Father’s Day landing this weekend, data released today found that working dads are willing to sacrifice their wages just to secure a more flexible working routine.

Research from Robert Half Canada shed a light on the sentiment of working fathers, 29% of them saying they’d accept a salary reduction to be fully remote. With that in mind, 54% of working dads planned to or started to look for a new job in the first half of 2023 – with nine in ten of that group citing flexibility as their main goal.

Flexibility for fathers

“Allowing employees to maintain their professional, personal, and parental responsibilities through hybrid and flexible work options is a major way companies can support the parents in their workforce, helping with overall workplace wellbeing, and recruitment and retention efforts,” Mike Shekhtman, senior regional director at Robert Half, tells HRD.

“Beyond that, other perks and benefits such as company top-ups for parental leave pay, and extra family planning benefits are also great ways for businesses to support the parents on their teams.”

And while a lot of studies focus purely on working mothers or “working parents”, there’s considerably less data around working fathers. According to one study from University of Twente, the report suggests that working mothers “feel more guilt than working fathers”, due to internalized gender stereotypes. However, recent pushes around equal childcare has led to more and more employers re-evaluating their own parental care policies.

Fully remote vs in-person collaboration

Speaking to Shekhtman, he tells HRD that this is where hybrid and remote working option should come to the forefront.

“Offering flexibility in some form - an umbrella system that can include hybrid and fully remote options - has benefits for worker satisfaction, work-life balance, productivity, and retentions, along with making companies who offer this more attractive to potential jobseekers,” he says.

“However, our research also shows that being in the office still has concrete benefits. Nearly two-thirds of professionals said they have more effective relationships with colleagues whom they’ve met face-to-face versus those they have not.

What’s more, the majority of employees are comfortable collaborating in person (47%) versus virtually (34%).  

“With that in mind, rather than settling on either end of the spectrum, companies can reap the benefits of both by offering flexibility through remote options with some purposeful on-site days for things like team building and collaborating, as well as other hybrid set-ups that meet the needs of both the business and individuals,” adds Shekhtman.

“Managers should communicate with their team members about their priorities and concerns, to help create schedules that work for everyone.”