Survey of Firms Digs Deeper Into Family Policies

Managers at Texas Instruments will soon begin taking a class on making decisions based not only on business needs but also on workers’ needs.

The effort is part of a growing realization by corporate America that to be family-friendly, a company can’t just set up programs on paper and wait for employees to sign up.

Reflecting this growing shift, Working Mother magazine has changed the way it compiles its annual list--published today in its October issue--of the best companies for working moms.

For the first time, the magazine has considered whether companies give work-life training to managers and whether managers’ pay is linked to their effectiveness in dealing with such issues. The magazine also gave closer scrutiny to whether work-family programs are well-used, in addition to considering usual criteria such as pay, child-care benefits and flexible scheduling.

“We’re digging a little more deeply to try and get at the culture, and how they’re addressing these issues,” said the magazine’s deputy editor, Deborah Wilburn. “You have to look hard at whether this is a Band-Aid approach or a public relations effort.”

Computer-chip maker Texas Instruments, which is revising a seminar on flexible work arrangements to emphasize how to make them succeed, won a spot on the prestigious list.

The magazine’s list of 100 top family-friendly companies does not include rankings, but instead lists 10 companies as exceptionally progressive. They are Citicorp/Citibank; Glaxo Wellcome Inc.; IBM; Johnson & Johnson; Eli Lilly; MBNA America; Merck & Co.; NationsBank; SAS Institute and Xerox.

Other companies on the list of 100 include Mattel Inc. of El Segundo, Patagonia Inc. of Ventura and Rockwell International Corp. of Costa Mesa.

The changes in the magazine’s annual list come as growing attention is being paid to the gaps between the widespread corporate rhetoric given to work-family concerns and the actual help offered to workers.

“A lot of companies are instituting programs,” said Betty Purkey, work-life manager at Dallas-based Texas Instruments. “Just doing that doesn’t make a whole lot of difference.”

A landmark study published this summer by the nonprofit Families & Work Institute found that nearly 40% of human resource representatives said their company didn’t make a “real and ongoing” effort to tell employees of available work-family programs.

Further, only 44% of companies hold supervisors accountable for sensitivity to employees’ work-family needs, the Institute found.

At the same time, research has revealed that a flexible work environment--allowing employees the autonomy to balance their home and work lives--leads to greater productivity and employee loyalty.

Yet building a truly flexible or family-friendly work environment usually means changing corporate culture, which has traditionally focused on rewarding attendance rather than productivity.

Even if programs for job-sharing exist, for example, workers are often reluctant to sign up because they worry that their boss will be mad or their career will be hurt if they do so. Often, their worries are well-founded; even progressive companies have close-minded managers.

“You can have all these programs, but if employees don’t feel safe, nobody will step forward and use them,” said Joan Crockett, senior vice president of human resources at Northbrook, Ill.-based Allstate Insurance, also named to this year’s list.

To show managers that Allstate is serious about being family-friendly, the company gives all new managers three days of training on how to foster a supportive work environment.

Allstate managers’ merit raises also are partly based on employee surveys that include a question on whether managers promote a family-friendly atmosphere.

At DuPont Co., the chemical giant based in Wilmington, Del., managers are evaluated on whether they support work-life goals, and some departmental managers must take a mandatory course on using flexibility as a business tool.

Drug maker Hoffmann-La Roche, based in Nutley, N.J., holds decision-makers accountable for helping women advance by identifying talent. It then goes one step further, holding executives accountable for ensuring that the women progress. Executives must report quarterly on their efforts.

“Programs are interesting, but what works is holding people accountable,” said Stephen Grossman, vice president of human resources. “You get what you measure.”