Employer Child Care Needs Assessments Enhance Understanding and Problem-Solving

Child care is an essential part of our country’s economy, providing parents an opportunity to work, attend school, and participate in training. And, it gives young children early learning experiences that help them to grow, thrive, and prepare for school. Across the US, parents face soaring child care costs, while child care providers struggle to maintain a workforce to meet families’ needs.

When parents struggle with child care, employers feel the impact as well. A lack of regular child care, inconsistent back up care, or the inability to obtain care entirely (due to cost, location, or availability, for example) can impact families’ ability to fully participate in the labor force. This often leads to missed work, reduced productivity, turnover, or parents leaving the workforce entirely.

How can employers partner with their employees to help solve child care challenges and, ultimately, support a stronger, stabler workforce?

Gather information from employees to understand child care needs. One of the best ways to understand employees’ child care needs and challenges is to ask them directly. We suggest gathering information from employees through a brief, anonymous survey. Key questions could include asking what type(s) of care they need, the challenges they experience when looking for care, barriers they experience obtaining care (e.g., need for emergency/back up care, cost, location, transportation) and what resources would be most helpful to ensure they can be successful at work. Asking these types of questions will help to build your understanding about employees’ experiences and provide you with valuable data that you can use to inform recruitment and retention strategies, benefits planning, and budgeting.

Build knowledge of the local child care landscape. Alongside surveying employees, we encourage employers to consider the current child care resources, gaps, and opportunities that are available in the communities where their employees live and work. Find out where local families go for information about child care, if financial supports are available (e.g., subsidies), and what the different types of providers are that offer care (e.g., child care centers, school district pre-kindergarten). Being familiar with the context will help employers draw connections to employees’ needs, and will lay the groundwork for helping to problem solve. 

Take inventory and explore solutions to help solve the problem. First, consider how often child care issues affect employees’ ability to work. If you’re not sure, the employee survey is an opportunity to learn; enhancing HR data collection (e.g., turnover data, length of position vacancy data, exist interview detail) can also be helpful. Also take inventory of any benefits or supports that are currently offered to employees to help meet their child care needs. There is a wide range of ways that employers can respond to employees’ child care challenges. On one end of the spectrum, employers might consider offering or expanding onsite child care. Employers can even partner with a child care program to provide reserved slots or back up/emergency child care options. Other benefits might include providing information/referrals, offering flexible hours, or providing dependent care flexible spending accounts.

By taking the steps to understand employees’ child care challenges and needs and build knowledge about the local child care system, employers will be well-positioned to help their employees. Efforts to strengthen families’ access to high-quality child care will likely help with employee retention. These supports are also a way to show value to and recruit prospective employees who are parenting young children. Together, they help to increase economic potential.

We encourage you to explore Foundations for Families’ Consulting Services. If your business or organization needs assistance with an employer child care needs assessment, please be in touch. Our team of consultants will work with your program to determine a process, timeline, and approach that is the best fit for your needs.

Thank you.

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