

Ask HN: How do you handle maternity leave for a critical member on a tiny team? - bhayden

If you have a small team, less than 10 people, and you have a critical member who needs to leave for over a month, how do you handle this? The laws protecting maternity leave seem to only apply to companies of greater than 50 people, but it seems morally wrong to deny someone this ability on a smaller team too.
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anigbrowl
Well, anyone on your time could fall under a bus or experience a catastrophic
medical emergency, so why not start with a general contingency plan for
unavoidable absences? Maternity leave is a limited and more predictable
absence, so if you have a plan to deal with the unexpected then accommodating
maternity leave should be comapritively easy. Brainstorm with everyone for a
few weeks, you don't have to mention right now that you're planning around
someone's pregnancy unless everyone already knows, but make sure you're not
putting your pregnant employee on the spot in a way that could be construed as
discriminatory/hostile work environment, if some other member of the team
started making disparaging comments about it.

You should have some sort of disaster preparedness plan in place anyway. There
is such a thing as key person insurance but I think that's designed to address
permanent loss of a team member and I have no idea about the economics. It
probably wouldn't cover this situation but it seems like something to be aware
of anyway.

It's nice that you are taking this issue seriously rather than waiting until
the law says you have to do so.

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IgorPartola
I was relatively recently involved in a similar situation: my wife's former
employer said they will not offer her paid maternity leave of any length,
despite them mentioning in that they would accommodate her when she was
getting hired. After she used all her vacation days and sick days to take just
barely 6 weeks (about half of what you really need to recover from childbirth
with no complications), she started looking for a new job. Found one quickly,
and with a nice salary increase too.

The moral of the story is that you should accommodate your team member in any
way possible or this critical person will leave after their maternity leave
for good. If they are so critical to your team that you feel you cannot lose
them for a month (about 1/3 of what you should give them), then can you really
afford to lose them shortly after they come back?

As for how to handle this in terms of salary: you should offer short term
disability insurance to your employees that covers maternity leave. It's too
late now, since you typically have to hold the policy for over a year before
maternity leave is covered, but do this for the future. Good luck!

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sstradling
I think this is a good (but hard) opportunity for building the rest of your
team. You're finding a real vulnerability in your team's structure, and being
proactive like you are is a good way of fixing it.

First, figure out exactly what makes this person so critical - it may seem
obvious, but break it down into specific tasks and skills. Maybe get them to
write down the things they do for each of these that took the most time to
figure out. Second, evaluate who else on your team can pick up a specific
skill or task, or who would best be able to grow into that particular role
element (rollette?). Finally, spend some time and sweat encouraging the rest
of the team to grow into these areas - make sure to show them you appreciate
their taking on the challenge. If no-one can step up for a specific rollette,
you may need to start recruiting.

Kudos, by the way, (as anigbrowl pointed out) for wanting to do the morally
right thing. Good luck

~~~
sstradling
(As a bonus, ask your departing teammate to take the opportunity to be away
from work to NOT think about their current job. Get them to daydream about
what they would love for their next step to be.)

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duncan_bayne
I'd ask this a slightly different way: how do you mitigate the risk of having
a critical person on a small team? Maternity leave is just one way in which
having a small 'bus number' (
[http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?BusNumber](http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?BusNumber) ) may
smite you.

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JonoW
1 month mat leave? Leaving aside the fact that this seems really short, people
often take 1 month holidays (I certainly have), i.e it seems a short enough
time not to fill it, as a contractor will probably not be that productive in a
month, and will cost you a lot. That said, a new mom coming back to work after
just a month is probably not going to be firing on all cylinders just yet, so
be patient :)

As for whether you should offer mat leave even if you don't have to -
absolutely, it will leave a bad taste in your teams mouth if you don't, and
will probably make anyone considering having children resign

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1123581321
What you do is have them do proactive documentation, arrangements, etc. ahead
of time, and then, as able, have them do a small amount of work from home that
is most critical and irreplaceable. This shouldn't be more than 10 hours per
week if you've planned for it.

The founders should be willing to take on the extra critical work if her
minimal contribution during the period isn't enough. If this takes more than a
small amount of their time or she will not be able to do anything
(hospitalization, complications), then you should be hiring another person or
a contractor for the role anyway.

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sharemywin
have you looked into finding a contractor for the work that needs done now.
Also, your kidding yourself if you think someone with a new baby is going to
pop right back into things with out missing a beat in a month.

~~~
infinii
^this Managing a maternity leave is much different from the 'getting hit by a
bus' scenario. if you have a key man risk and lose someone due to accident or
resignation, you hire and deal with the pain of getting them up to speed. With
maternity leaves, you're legally required to maintain that position for the
person to come back to. Hiring a permanent staff isn't an option usually.
Contractors are best bet, however for 1 month maternity leaves; it doesn't
leave much time for the contractor to become proficient/worthy.

~~~
sharemywin
I wouldn't try pushing this person back into things right away. A start up is
a big deal, and maybe even something you'll regret doing wrong. Missing time
with your new born baby, that's something you'll really regret for a life
time.

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JSeymourATL
> critical member on a tiny team?

Have you talked with her to get a sense of what she's thinking and what an
ideal future work scenario might look like? Be sure to communicate her
importance to the team.

Cover the salary on-leave, it buys tremendous goodwill. But be fully prepared
in case she doesn't return from maternity leave. If you haven't been there
yet, it's a life changer on a variety of levels.

If retention becomes an issue-- consider allowing her to work virtual office
and/or shift to part-time for the next several months.

~~~
spdustin
Parent made the important point (no pun intended): There's a non-trivial
chance she won't return to work. Having a kid changes the perspectives of the
new parents - going from "take" to "give" \- in ways that can't be undone.

Don't make the paid leave contingent on her returning, or you'll have negative
feelings about her participation and possibly about her peers on the team.
Mentally, call it a severance package, even if she intends to return. Let her
and the money go, and focus on overall contingency plans, as mentioned by
others.

