Our Family Policy is market leading, modern and forward thinking. We caught up with Emily Howey, People Business Partner, to understand what makes Cornerstone stand out in supporting employees during both celebratory and challenging times.
Emily, what’s the background to Cornerstone’s Family Policy?
Earlier this year we created a brand new Family Policy to add to our market leading health and wellbeing initiatives, and to recognise that the lives of our employees do not start and end at work. We researched what was showing up in the market place and compared this to our offering. We felt we could make improvements and revised our new Family Policy, which we believe reflects modern times and is, without doubt, market leading.
Which areas of Family Policy are Cornerstone market leading?
The policy is incredibly comprehensive with 2 elements in particular that I’ll make special mention to. The first is our Maternity Leave where we have increased from 13 weeks full pay to 16 weeks. So four months at full pay and then after that its 26 weeks at half-pay which is very competitive within the market place.
The other area is Cornerstone’s Secondary Parental Leave provision. Our policy recognises that today’s families are diverse and varied. The policy and the language contained within it reflects this, for example, including adoptive as well as birth parents and families with same gender parents. We offer our employees 12 weeks full pay which is inclusive of the statutory two weeks enabling secondary parents to be able to spend time with their family at such a special and important time.
In less celebratory times, where does Cornerstone stand?
We understand that there may be times when our employees may need a bit of extra care and support and we are proud to be able to offer this to our employees via our new Family Policy. For example, we provide support for employees who may need time to attend fertility treatment, or who are experiencing domestic abuse. We have also created further flexibility and support for those experiencing the menopause. Affecting at least 50% of the population, we believe it is an important and essential consideration.
Through this policy Cornerstone has once again shown that it adapts and changes with society and has its people at its heart, making it a great place to work!
