Ivona Hideg, Wilfrid Laurier University

Parental Leaves and Gender Equality: The Effect of Parental Leaves on Women’s and Men’s Careers
Ivona Hideg

Description

Semester: 
Winter 2019
Lecture Time: 
Friday, March 15, 2019 - 1:30pm to 3:00pm
Lecture Location: 

R0220 Ross School of Business

Introduced By: 
Tiani Perkins

Abstract

Parental leaves are critical for gender equality as they help employees manage both having careers and children, and recent trends in many countries including Canada entail encouraging longer parental leaves. Yet, past research shows that longer parental leaves can have unintended negative career impacts, especially for women, while the effects for men are less well understood. In this talk, I will present data examining the effect of parental leaves on both women’s and men’s careers. I will first present a set of studies examining effects of longer (one year and above) parental leaves on women’s careers. Given that past research shows that longer parental leaves may unintentionally harm women’s career progress, while they are also beneficial for the health of mothers and babies, here we sought to identify the mechanism underlying negative effects of longer (vs. shorter) maternity leaves: undermined perceptions of agency. That is, to enable mothers to do both, i.e., take longer maternity leaves and advance their careers, it was important to identify an underlying mechanism and consequently utilize this knowledge to test interventions that boost agency perceptions and mitigate negative effects of longer parental leaves. In a context of Canadian parental leave policies, we found that undermined perceptions of agency mediated the negative effects of a longer (i.e., one year) compared to a shorter (i.e., one month) maternity leave on job commitment (Study 1); providing information about a woman’s agency mitigates the unintended negative effects of a longer maternity leave (Study 2); and the usage of an organizational program that enables women to stay in touch with the workplace while on maternity leaves enhances agency perceptions and mitigates negative consequences (Study 3). Next, given that true gender equality involves men’s experiences as well, I will present findings from two studies on the effects of parental leaves on men’s career outcomes. Contrary to the negative effects of parental leaves on women’s careers, we theorized and found in a sample of undergraduate students (Study 4) and employees (Study 5) that the effects of parental leaves on men’s careers can be positive due to others’ enhanced perceptions of men’s “communality,” i.e., traits generally ascribed to women such as warmth, friendliness, and a sensitivity to the needs of others. Implications for theory, practice, and gender equality broadly are discussed.

Recording & Additional Notes

Ivona Hideg is an Associate Professor of OB/HRM in the Lazaridis School of Business and Economics at Wilfrid Laurier University. She holds a Ph.D. in OB/HRM Management from the Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto, and MSc in I/O Psychology from the University of Waterloo.

Ivona’s main program of research includes workplace diversity, equality, and inclusion. In her work she focuses on gender, but also examines issues surrounding culture, ethnicity, language, and socioeconomic background diversity. Her research has been published in top-tier refereed journals such as Academy of Management Journal (AMJ), Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (JPSP), Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes (OBHDP), and Psychological Science. She received Early Researcher Award from the Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation and her work is also funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research of Canada (SSHRC), a major federal government funding agency in Canada. She has also been awarded two visiting faculty fellowships, at Católica Lisbon (Portugal) and RMIT University in Australia. She is currently serving on the editorial boards of three leading journals in the field: Administrative Science Quarterly, Journal of Management, and Organizational Psychology Review.

Her research has been featured in media outlets such as the Harvard Business Review, Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, The New York Times, the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, the Huffington Post, and the Record, among others. Her recent paper on the effect of maternity leaves on women’s career outcomes was recently featured as IdeaWatch by Harvard Business Review. She is also a frequent guest speaker on radio programs, and she recently wrote an influential research-based opinion article in the Globe and Mail (major Canadian newspaper) about maternity leave policies and their impacts on women’s careers and gender equality and has also contributed to Harvard Business Review. In addition, she has influenced policy making as a consultant for the federal government of Canada on parental leave policies and the recruitment of women into the Canadian Armed Forces. Additionally, she served on the Board of Directors of Focus for Ethnic Women, a non-profit organization that helps immigrant women to navigate and integrate into the Canadian workplace. She teaches Human Resource Management and a doctoral seminar on diversity and equality. She also leads the EDGE (Emotion, Diversity, and Gender Equity) lab where she works with a group of talented graduate and undergraduate students. For more details on the lab research projects please see the EDGE lab website: https://sites.google.com/site/ivonahideg/. Ivona is also a proud mom of two young children.