How Paternity Leave Can Change Your Career and Workplace Perspective
It's an opportunity for men to experience different challenges and to realize how much work it is to care for a new baby
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New moms are usually the ones who take a lot of time off after having a baby. However, more companies have started to offer longer paternity leaves for new fathers. When I started my career in 2004, my employer offered five days of paternity leave. That’s often not enough to last a hospital stay after birth, never mind enough time to form a bond with your new baby. My current employer gives eight weeks of 100% paid paternity leave and I’m on week four.
This is a benefit every new dad must take advantage of if offered. It’s even more important to experience the higher up you are in the company where you work. Your leave will give you a better perspective of the effort it takes to care for a newborn. It will help you empathize with new parents and realize they need different support. Sometimes men and even some women who don’t have kids, don’t understand this. It changes your perspective when you take leave to handle those responsibilities.
Women are told they can have it all with a career and family, but that message doesn’t apply to men. They just get messages about climbing up the corporate ladder in someone else’s company to build their boss’s dreams and nothing about winning with their family. Men need to hear they can have a career and a fulfilling family life too. We will have a more equitable society if men pull their weight outside the workplace.
Paternity leave can change your feelings on what’s most important in your life. Men get very invested in their jobs and the status they give. Work can become the main part of their identity instead of more important titles like “Husband” and “Father.” Nobody will care about your career and how good of an employee you were at your funeral. People will talk about the important impact you had on their lives. The fact you made it to VP in three years won’t matter to anyone.
You realize how important of a job and title that “Father” is on paternity leave when it’s only you and your baby. You are responsible for raising a human being who could have a big impact on the world. It’s up to you to help ensure it’s a positive one. If you get extended paternity leave, there’s no better time to develop a life-long bond and establish your place in your child’s life. You will have positive effects on your child’s life and he/she will return the favor.
The more fathers in the corporate world who take paternity leave will have a positive effect on their workplace and family. It makes men better by having them assume more responsibility, male executives and managers become more aware of childcare which will help change their perspective for the better on what their female employees experience, get fathers active in the home, and strengthen traditional family values and structure to better society.