The Parental Challenge is not the competition for the best parent, or the one for the most patient, nor for the one who receives the most “awww” by showing their child's photos. No, no, it's much better. It is a challenge for companies. So that they engage in a process of support for future parents, new parents, parents of several children, grieving parents, and all the others.

It is an initiative that was launched by 4 active women in search of change and evolution in the face of ever more alarming testimonies and figures.

For example, did you know that 80% of women have heard sexist remarks related to motherhood in the workplace ? And of course, women are not the only victims. 59% of men claim to have been victims too. For every "ahh, it's Wednesday, it's true that we can't count on her", that a woman has heard, a man will surely have received a "no, but your wife can surely pick them up at the school, why do you have to do it?

We agree, we have all heard this kind of sentence once in our life. So here's what we tell them: And no, Jean-Mi, I want to pick up my children from school because that's quite simply my role.

After 2 years of global pandemic, 4 confinements and thousands of hours working from home, we can no longer pretend that employees who are parents magically stop being parents the moment they log on to their workstation. . The best thing to do to reduce the amount of stress felt by these employees but also their productivity at work - and yes Jamy, a happy and comfortable person at work will always be more efficient and motivated than a stressed and exhausted person nerve - is that the company makes itself more adaptable to their schedule. It is to leave more freedom to choose the days when teleworking could be useful, it is also to give parents time to adapt to all the changes in their daily life after the arrival of a child. And with the Oé team, we want to reconcile work and family life.

What is the Parenting Challenge?

It is the bible of the accompaniment of the parents on their place of work . It is intended for everyone in the company, not just managers or HR. The advice that is given in the Official Guide to the Parental Challenge allows everyone to understand the existing legislation and the actions that can be put in place to gain benevolence in all situations, however unique they may be. Today there are around a hundred concrete actions to be implemented.

At Oé, we loved the approach and we decided to put both feet in the dish last January.

What is the Parental Challenge all about?

In addition to being a pragmatic and easy-to-apply guide, it is also a charter that companies can choose to sign to guarantee good practices with their employees on permanent contracts. We would also like to point out that all the members of the team are concerned by this challenge. Yes all! For men, for women, whether on a bike or behind a desk, in a warehouse or on the move. All managers, men and different team members are on the same footing when it comes to it's about the rights they have as parents.

Here are the 12 measures provided for in the charter :

1. Allow all confirmed employees on permanent contracts to benefit from measures related to parenthood , without seniority conditions.
2. Apply the law and communicate their rights to all employees
3. Better support long leave (maternity, adoption, second parent, parental) related to parenthood.
4. Protect the confidentiality of employees so that they can assert their rights and benefit from the measures without having to confide in their personal journey.
5. Authorize and remunerate the absences of employees applying for adoption for mandatory appointments taking place during working hours (the information meeting and the appointments necessary for the psychosocial assessment of the applicants).
6. Equip our managers to better support and welcome parenthood, and raise their awareness of discrimination.
7. Offer all employee parents whose positions allow it 100% teleworking in the key moments before and after parenthood.
8. Set up work schedules that do not exclude any employee
9. Propose paid 3-day bereavement leave in the event of a miscarriage, for biological mothers and second parents alike.
10. Encourage the involvement of second parents from the first moments of their parenthood.
11. Financially support maternity , second parent and adoption leave and lighten the administrative aspects.
12. Grant paid “sick child” days off .

How does that translate to us?

First of all, we don't have any meetings after 6 p.m. because it's not because we're a start-up that we don't count the hours. Whether you're a parent or not, you firmly believe in the right to disconnect . Everyone chooses how they organize themselves for their hours. But we will always be careful to keep schedules inclusive of all personal situations.

Then, we organize ourselves well in advance for parental leave because you can't improvise not having a member of the team for several weeks. By being organized and planning, we allow future parents to focus only on their little human and colleagues not to bear a double workload unnecessarily. For example, our CEO and co-founder will soon be going on paternity leave for 1 month (we're so happy for him, yay!). And that's normal. We love having him with us every day, but he will be able to stay at home with his little family with both eyes closed (also because he will be very tired).

For further :

Don't hesitate to talk about this challenge with your company if you think it could improve on this subject. Even if you don't think you can make this kind of decision, we still invite you to visit their site ( Parental Challenge ) to help you broach the subject with your hierarchy :)