Some of the best employees you’ll never hire are wishing they could work for you. They can’t, or more accurately, they won’t, because they have chosen the role of stay-at-home parent over that of employee.
Hudson-based toy manufacturer Little Tikes may have found a solution — one that gets the best workers on the payroll, keeps concerned parents near their children and even produced a natural product testing department. Little Tikes has an on-site day care center.
“I think it’s the perspective — the Little Tikes company has this benefit,” says J. Scott Silver, vice president of human resources. “They do provide it, and I think it gives people the perspective we’re more in the front — out there leading other companies in terms of what we offer our associates.
“It’s interesting to watch visitors when we take them down into the plant or walk them around the building, and then they see the day care center,” Silver says. “Being a toy manufacturer, it’s a lift just to show people the kind of products that you make. And it’s an additional lift when they actually see kids; and they see the playground; and they see our toys out there. It just provides a more favorable environment.”
The company supplements 30 percent of the day care, says Jodi Grawunder, the administrator and a teacher in the program. For that reason, teachers tend be better paid and have a longer tenure.
“We don’t have a high turnover like other child care centers. (They) might have a high turnover just because they have a hard time paying their teachers well,” she says.
The children must be potty trained and can remain in the program until they enter kindergarten.
Having the center on the ground of the Little Tikes facility makes employees more comfortable. They often visit their children at snack or lunch times, and if there is ever any worry, a parent is right there. According to Grawunder, employees without children occasionally visit the center and “just watch the kids for awhile. It kinds of brings them back to reality — why we’re here —what Little Tikes is all about.”
There are 60 to 80 parents waiting to get their children into the program — some who aren’t even born yet, Grawunder says. Once they learn they are pregnant, mothers often sign up. The wait can be as long as a year and a half, and at one time, it approached three years. Grawunder keeps them on the list until their children are old enough to enter the program.
Teacher Janet Quinn, a 7-1/2 year veteran of the program, applauds the company for its effort. “We’re proud to be here. I’m proud to work for a company that would support child care. Very few companies back corporate child care centers.”
Quinn has seen appreciation in the parents.
“I’ve had many of them tell me that that was one of the greatest benefits of working here,” she says. “I’ve had parents that left here to go to another job that waited to leave until their child went to kindergarten, or until they were through with the program, because they so enjoyed being able to bring their child to work with them.”
Of course, the corporate motive is not entirely selfless. The company does put the children to work. Whenever engineers or designers want a kids-eye view of new toy, they give the day care center a call. The 20-plus children eagerly volunteer to run, jump, throw, swing, slide, sit on, rock or crawl through a toy which has yet to cover the shelves of your local toy store.
Often several times a week, designers bring in toys to check on the age appropriateness or how a child plays with the product, Grawunder says.
While Little Tikes does get some practical use from the day care center, the advantage is in the good will it inspires.
“It means everything to me,” says Lisa Bouplon, an executive secretary in the human resources department. “It’s the best benefit that a company could offer. I don’t feel that I’m separated all day.”
