Netflix announces unlimited maternity and paternity leave
Netflix has made the news this week by announcing unlimited maternity and paternity leave during the first year after a child’s birth or adoption. It’s not uncommon for employers to try to offer the entrepreneurial lifestyle within their corporate ethos and this change is just the latest in Netflix’s famous approach to HR. By allowing flexible time management and unlimited holidays, for example, companies like Netflix want to retain their best talent.
Dr Shainaz Firfiray, of Warwick Business School, comments on Netfilx’s new policy: “Companies that lack fully integrated work-life policies are rapidly losing talent as employees leave in multitudes to develop more flexible and personally fulfilling careers. In the contemporary labour market where workers are rapidly switching jobs and many of those switches are triggered by a desire to achieve better work-life balance, corporate HR practices should keep pace with changing employee needs and attitudes.”
Is “workforce-as-a-service” a driver behind better benfits?
The HR Dive recently asked: “First came software-as-a-service (SaaS). Now, is it time for workforce-as-a-service (WaaS)?” Not unlike the underlying concept behind SaaS, WaaS simply means that businesses can use their employees/workers as needed. Employers can scale their workforce up or down to match business ebbs and flows.
In the UK, there has been plenty of talk about Zero Hours contracts, which in essence are a way of achieving a workforce “on tap”. The main difference is that with Zero Hours, the employees are often at the mercy of their employers to an extent whereas the direction employees are taking suggests more autonomy for the employee. Platforms like People per Hour, Upwork and even Uber allow employees an avenue to offer their services more widely without being linked to just one or two employers.
This kind of freelancing is very attractive to many who would otherwise not dare make the leap to become self-employed. The ease of finding employment combined with the freedom to pick and choose your jobs and hours may tempt skilled workers to leave their 9-to-5 jobs in search of a more fulfilling work life, like suggested by Dr Firfiray.