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This week, team Josie had the chance to comment on Caregiving as an identity, a critical topic that has come up in so many of our employer conversations. We are tremendously grateful to S. Mitra Kalita and the team at Charter for this opportunity! Click here for the full article and see select quotes below!
“Childcare responsibilities expanded to include grandparents, older siblings, friends, neighbors, and others within a pod,” says Michelle Yu, co-founder and CEO of Josie, a service for both parents transitioning back to work and their employers. “Even the term itself is more action-oriented—it signals someone’s wellbeing is resting on your shoulders and you are literally needing to give care.”
“At a more systemic level, ensuring you have a way to identify trends among your caregiver population, sharing those back with the right stakeholders, and using it to drive policies and programs that best support caregivers at every stage in the game,” Yu said. “This includes everything from recruiting to onboarding to performance reviews.”
“It’s also important to understand the intersections of caregiving as an identity with other attributes,” she added, mentioning mothers of color and single mothers, who have always shouldered more of the burden of caregiving but were also disproportionately affected by the pandemic. Women of color, for example, make up more than half the workers in service jobs such as housekeeping, personal care, and nursing assistance.”
