Companies need to address child-care crisis before bringing workers back to the office

Brigid Schulte was interviewed by CNBC about the importance of robust child care infrastructure for working parents:

CNBC: What should companies be doing instead? It’s not unreasonable to want to have some employees in the office.

Schulte: Every business is different, but best practices should revolve around some basic questions. As a business, what is your core function and where do people need to be to do that work? How can people come back to a site that reflects flexibility? Why are we barreling down the road to bring people back to the office when companies don’t know what they’re facing at home? Ask people what they need. Survey them first, anonymously, to hear about the difficulties they’re having at home and with child care. When you have the data you can then better figure out how to offer flexibility that’s actually useful. Look at what’s worked in the last 18 months. There is so much wisdom among the people who have been doing the work. Some people who are in small apartments or who are lonely, they want more comradery. Other people hate the commute and have become more engaged with their families and child-care needs. But a company won’t know any of this unless they seek out the information.