HRnews.cz published an interview with Jana Skalkova, Senior specialist from the Training Department of Ceskoslovenska obchodni banka (CSOB) - a universal bank operating in the Czech Republic, a member of Belgium’s KBC group. CSOB employs 6500 people in the Czech Republic, 800 of which are parents on parental leave. Jana Skalkova is responsible for leading the bank's "Program for mothers and fathers".
The program was created in reaction to a baby boom in 2008 when 20 mothers on average had been leaving CSOB for their maternity leave every month. Most of them were women in the positions of specialists and senior specialists and the bank did not want to lose them in the future. The main aim of the program is to help mothers and fathers to balance their roles of parents and employees. All employees are free to join it.
The program is a comprehensive package that includes education, preparatory workshops for parents who are leaving for or returning from their parental leave, or communication through electronic journals to inform them about current events in the bank. The core of whole program is, however, to engage parents in part-time work during their parental leave.
Currently, there are about 200 parents in the program and 120 of them are working. "Due to the fact that only 3 percent of Czech parents work during their parental leave, I think that it's a good result," says Jana Skalkova.