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The plans to bring a Maternity Protection amendment into law is a ‘positive step’ for women in the workplace, according to Mary Connaughton, Director of Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) Ireland.
“We’ve made great strides towards equality in the workplace with the introduction of gender pay gap reporting, so it’s encouraging to now see plans approved to create a fairer system when it comes to maternity leave.
“We all know life is far from straightforward and unfortunately, many pregnant women and those with young babies face the added stress of serious illness during this time,” she says.
The Government approved plans over the summer, which will allow women undergoing treatment for cancer or other serious illnesses to postpone their maternity leave by up to 52 weeks, ensuring that those affected will not be forced to take this leave during treatment.
“Knowing that their maternity leave entitlement can be paused in these circumstances offers some security in what is already a very difficult situation,” says Mary.
Parent’s leave
Another change is the extension of Parent’s Leave by two weeks, as of 1 August. This leave is now nine weeks per parent until a child is two years old.
According to Mary, this helps families when juggling the work-life balance. She says, “We see both developments as progressive. Another thing that came through from our research is the fact that companies are having to respond to workforce expectations. Employee expectations are driving some of the changes and the way companies are looking at their HR practices and their policies.”
This includes new developments, looking at hybrid working and sustainability practices. All of these things are driving the change in organisations to be able to respond better.
Advancements in technology have meant that there are more conversations around the opportunity that Artificial Intelligence (AI) presents in businesses and to HR.
“A lot of organisations are still trying to work out what they can do, what they should do and what we’re hearing is they are starting to experiment,” says Mary.
Annual HR awards
The CIPD annual HR awards are taking place in February 2025, with categories designed each year to reflect the core areas of work of the people profession as well as current trends that affect HR.
“The awards recognise the best HR and people practices in Ireland, and we have a fantastic calibre of industry leaders involved,” says Mary.
To keep pace with change, the SME category (less than 150 employees) has been revised for 2025 to put the emphasis on good people management in terms of sustainability and the customer/employee experience. CL
Entries are being accepted until 16 October 2024. Full details on the awards are available at cipd.org/ie.
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