A new story from CNET today highlights how employees at Silicon Valley companies, including Apple, are struggling to balance professional demands with childcare while working from home. For its part, Apple says it is taking several steps to help its employees through this transition.
Apple says that it has increased communications with managers and employees during the coronavirus outbreak. This includes encouraging employees to ask “for help or accommodations,” but managers have also been told to “proactively help employees, too.” For instance, this includes offering increased flexibility for employees who are taking care of kids or elderly family members.
In a statement, Apple spokeswoman Kristin Huguet doubled down on Apple’s commitment to helping employees through this “trying time.”
No deadline is too important, and no priority is more urgent, than caring for our loved ones. Our goal is to be flexible, collaborative, and accommodating of every parent and caregiver on our teams. This is a trying time for everyone — especially parents — and we want to do all we can to support every member of our Apple family.
Apple employees have been working from home since at least early March. Apple executives held a company-wide virtual meeting last week, during which Tim Cook said the company does not yet know when employees will return to physical offices.
The full report from CNET is well worth a read, with details on how Silicon Valley companies such as Uber, Facebook, and Google are responding to the new working requirements caused by COVID-19.