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inclusion: Accommodating spouses/partners
:
Spouse/partner committees
1 A broad range of options exists for supporting spouses/partners, many of which are listed in the Sample Practices, some of which have been developed by individual Centers to meet unique needs. However, there are still questions about “who will do all this supporting?”. In other words, who is going to:
- acquire information about duty stations, entitlements and employment opportunities;
- identify sources of language training or cultural orientation;
- look after invitations to seminars, social functions; or
- collect CVs and competency summaries for circulation to meet potential consulting needs?
2 For many of the above questions, the answer is (or could be) “the Center’s HR group”. Obviously this would represent a substantial workload, particularly when accommodating not only headquarters spouses/partners but also their counterparts at regional and country stations. In some cases and for some issues, there may be a more effective solution: form a spouse/partner committee.
Benefits of a spouse/partner committee
3 Peer support – The principal benefit of a spouse/partner committee
is peer support for spouses and partners. For some issues, it may be
more comfortable for a spouse/partner to seek advice/information from
a peer, rather than tracking down the right HR person and finding a mutually
convenient time to meet. For other issues, HR would be the principal
source of expert (and binding) advice.
4 Personal experience – Members of a spouse/partner committee can provide a lot of information/advice based on personal experience, coupled with high empathy for the enquirer’s situation. Locally recruited HR staff members may not readily appreciate some of the challenges faced by an expatriate spouse/partner, because they have never personally experienced those challenges. Internationally recruited HR staff members may not readily appreciate some of the challenges faced by local spouses, again because they have never personally experienced them.
5 Intellectual resource – A spouse/partner committee is potentially a powerful intellectual resource. Scientific organizations are staffed by people with training ranging from scientific PhDs, through masters degrees in science and administration, and bachelors degrees and technical certificates in science/technology or the administrative equivalent. Often their spouses have similar levels of training.
6 Latest information – A spouse/partner committee tends to have the latest information. This is interlinked with the “personal experience” issue above. Knowledge gained from an enquiry (e.g. about employer requirements) yesterday can be shared with peers tomorrow.
7 Cultural understanding – Spouse/partner committees foster cultural understanding. It is one thing to sit through a lecture about national or regional cultural issues at one’s duty station. It is far more enlightening to associate with peers drawn from different cultures, and to have the opportunity to ask questions that will forestall potential cultural misunderstandings.
Relationships with HR
8 A spouse/partner committee must be careful
not to usurp the role and responsibilities of HR. There needs to be a
collaborative relationship in which:
- the spouse/partner committee seeks advice from HR on policies, practices, etc., that influence spouse/partner issues, and
- acts as a communication channel to HR, feeding back information its members have acquired about employment, professional development, life on-station (particularly in smaller, more remote duty stations), and emerging problems within the spouse/partner community.
9 This requires some form of agreement – perhaps documented through TORs for the committee – about the division of labor and responsibility between HR and the committee. Having established this agreement, it then needs to be interpreted flexibly. It should be a foundation for action, not a constraint on action.
Supporting the committee
10 Obviously a lot of the technical support
(e.g. information about administrative policies and practices) would
come from HR. In return, the committee’s
activities should save HR a reasonable amount of work that it would
otherwise have to do within its own resources, e.g. investigations
into local employment opportunities, local family facilities, local
professional development opportunities, etc. Note that, in this context, “local” refers
to opportunities unique to every duty station, not just headquarters.
Employing a committee coordinator
11 Notwithstanding the support from HR, the committee will need someone
to coordinate its activities. In a large city this might require effort
equivalent to a part-time job. In such circumstances, Centers might
be wise to employ one of the spouses/partners as committee coordinator.
The coordinator would not only coordinate activities at headquarters
but would also be the link to smaller sub-committees established at
regional and country stations. The coordinator would be expected to
report periodically on spouses’/partners’ difficulties,
solutions and emerging issues to, say, the Director of Corporate Services
(or equivalent).
12 The committee also requires other facilities/resources, e.g. access to meeting rooms, seminar facilities, photocopying, etc. Spouses/partners might also need access to services such as Internet, which might best be coordinated through the committee. It makes sense for the Center to provide these facilities/resources, many of which (e.g. meeting rooms) would cost the Center little.
13 Finally, Centers should consider the desirability of providing seed funding for certain initiatives proposed by spouse/partner committees. These initiatives would have to be judged on their merits and in the context of the Center’s financial position. However, precedents exist within the CGIAR (e.g. the IITA Community Resources Center; the IRRI Family Services Center) that have been very successful in meeting spouse/partner needs.
RECOGNIZING THE LIMITATIONS OF A SPOUSE/PARTNER COMMITTEE
14 While a spouse/partner committee can be an excellent resource for
meeting spouse/partner needs, typically it is not useful for assisting
with individual problems of a personal nature, such as loneliness or
depression. Consequently Centers need to consider options for a “help-line” for
such problems.
15 An Employee Assistance Program which also accommodates spouses/partners/family is probably the best option. This is a specialized service to staff (and, desirably, spouse/partner/family) that typically provides short-term, professional and confidential counseling, and addresses issues such as emotional or physical abuse, changing careers, coping with change, depression, emotional stress and anxiety, family relationship issues, financial problems, grief and bereavement, low self esteem, managing conflict, marriage and family problems, midlife crisis, relationships with co-workers, stress management, substance abuse (including alcohol and tobacco abuse), and workload management.
16 However, if the Center
does not have such a program, what should the spouse/partner in difficulties
do (who should she/he see, or telephone)? Has she/he been given any information
by the Center about what to do in such circumstances?
Good practice
• establish a spouse/partner committee
with clearly defined TORs and inter-relationship with HR function;
• encourage spouse/partner sub-committees at regional and country stations;
• consider appointing a spouse/partner as committee coordinator, perhaps
on a part-time contract;
• provide facilities to support committee operations;
• consider providing modest seed funding for worthy initiatives.
© CGIAR Gender & Diversity
Program 2006