ABN invited to consult on new Work and Family program
Posted by: sdafnis in News and Updates, tags: government forum, life balance, work and family, work/life balanceAs part of its $12 million commitment, the competitive grants program will provide between $5,000 and $15,000 to small businesses to help meet the set-up costs of family friendly working arrangements. The grants will support a range of initiatives, including:
- establishing rosters based on school terms and alternative core hours, for example, 10am to 3pm;
- developing workplace policies on unpaid leave for carers and workers who have children with disability or other special needs;
- providing facilities for employees with young children such as family rooms; and
- setting up workplace mentoring.
With up to $15 000 to allocate per small business, the Government is seeking innovative proposals that suit the individual needs of the business to promote a diverse range of family friendly initiatives.
ABN Board member Susan McGrath and Chairperson Suzi Dafnis will represent the ABN at the forum and we are interested to obtain input from members before 30 November. Please contact policy@abn.org.au, or call Susan direct on 0439 908 108 if you would like to discuss. Alternatively you can comment on this post.
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October 27th, 2008 at 10:46 am
Admin Bandit is a micro home based business and has been established as a “tele-working” business. ie. providers and staff work remotely. We are putting in place policies to facilitate staff working flexibly from home as the norm rather than the exception.
This will include daily huddle meetings of 15 mins, weekly, monthly and quarterly special purpose meetings and use of current technologies to facilitate good communication and a high performing team. It will also involve staff selection processes to identify staff who thrive in a remote team environment and OH&S assessments of home offices, contracts describing the expections of working from home eg. office maintained in a safe state and free of obstacles.
We will be engaged as a case study in a research project with the University of Canberra to help us identify and address what is working and build upon it and what is not working so it can be addressed.
As a microbusiness, it would be helpful for grants to cover:-
- establishing these teleworking processes and policies;
- the costs of having OH&S assessments done of staff home offices;
- implementing cutting edge technologies to facilitate good communication.