National Australia Bank enhances parental leave policy in Asia

National Australia Bank (NAB) has released details of its enhanced parental leave policy which was launched in Asia in June 2016.

The policy was launched in an effort to ensure that parental leave is available to all eligible employees regardless of gender and marital status and includes the option for primary carers to take unpaid leave for a period of up to 12 months - of which NAB pays up to 12 weeks leave - without impacting the individual’s job scope or career path.

Kate Colley, head of people, Asia and International Branches, commented:“At NAB we want to be Australia and New Zealand’s most respected bank – a key way we can achieve that vision is to understand and support our people by making it easy for them to reach their career and life goals.

“The Asia launch of the parental leave policy now aligns NAB in Asia with our Group’s efforts in supporting married and single parents of children – biological or adopted – through greater work flexibility when they are the primary or secondary carer."

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Under the enhanced policy, parental leave is available to all employees who have completed 12 months of continuous service at the time of taking the leave regardless of gender.

Leave options include pre-natal leave, primary carer’s leave – paid and unpaid, secondary carer’s leave – paid and unpaid, adoption leave, and special parental leave.

The bank notes that upon the employee's return from the leave, should their role no longer exist as a result of organisational changes, NAB work with the employee to identify a comparable role.

She explained that the enhanced parental leave policy considers the needs of NAB's people from the time they are expecting or adopting a child right through to returning to work after a period of parental leave and provides them with a variety of leave options and working arrangements.

“As our understanding increases of the broader positive cognitive and emotional outcomes for children when fathers are given the opportunity to participate more fully in family life and childcare, we are proud to encourage our male employees in Asia to benefit from the parental leave policy," Colley said.

“In doing so, we also want to better support and advance women’s careers by creating a culture that provides equal opportunity to all parents, regardless of gender and life goals.”

In addition to the parental leave, in order to enable employees to unleash their potential to the fullest, NAB also offers a range of flexible working arrangements to allow our employee work in a way that better suitstheir lifestyle.

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Options includes working some of the normal hours at home, or another remote location; flexible start and/or finish times; job sharing, or moving from full-time to part-time; working the same number of hours over less days; taking lifestyle leave to volunteer, further studies or interests.

"The results of recent employee engagement surveys confirm that our efforts have produced positive impact," the bank stated.

Close to 90% of NAB's workforce indicated that they have the flexibility to accommodate various priorities at work, at home and/or in the community.

"This affirms a strong tracking of our efforts in educating and promoting workplace flexibility," it added.

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