At Investa, we work hard to curate an open and inclusive culture where our people feel safe to bring their whole selves to work, every day. We know that by doing this, our diverse and talented workforce are empowered to do their best work, delivering innovative, sustainable solutions for all stakeholders – for today and tomorrow.
We want all of our people to have a great career experience with Investa and reach their full potential. By providing a supportive, caring and inclusive workplace for families, we support our parents and carers to integrate their work and family lives in a way that works for them, contributes positively to their wellbeing and responds to their unique needs.
We know that providing a Family Friendly Workplace through our policies, culture and leadership is critical to attracting and retaining talented people. We also recognise the significant role we play in driving improved gender equality outcomes. Supporting working families is an important way to help to create a societal shift, enabling men to participate and enjoy a greater role in caring responsibilities.
We understand that every individual’s journey to parenthood is different. That’s why Investa’s Parental Leave policy and benefits are market-leading in their inclusivity. We actively work to support our people as they transition into life as a parent, and importantly through their return to work.
Our parental leave provisions are gender neutral, promoting a shared care model. Our leave provisions apply equally to birth, adoption and surrogacy, regardless of gender identity and sexual orientation. Importantly, we also provide paid leave to support our people who suffer the tragic loss of a child through miscarriage or stillbirth.
There are no eligibility requirements around tenure to access any of our parental leave benefits. Our goal is to support mid-career talent to join Investa with the confidence that their family plans do not have to be ‘put on hold’ to progress their career (or vice versa).
Our benefits include:
During and on return from parental leave, our employees can benefit from:
Our inclusive and holistic approach to supporting working parents has been well received by our people, and by prospective employees interested in joining our team. We are proud that our return to work rate was 100% in FY2021, and that high retention rates continue to be achieved for staff who have taken parental leave.
Our senior leaders actively encourage our male team members to take parental leave. As a result, we have seen an increase in the number of men taking parental leave for extended periods of time.
Our parental leave policy was one of the contributing factors to Investa being recognised as a Workplace Gender Equality Agency Employer of Choice for Gender Equality for 2019-21.
Importantly, we continue to see strong, positive feedback in relation to our diversity and inclusion efforts, particularly around supporting families and parents, through our employee engagement surveys.
At Investa, we believe that supporting working families is critical to employee engagement, supporting work-life integration and employee wellbeing, as well as attraction and retention of talent. We understand the clear link between a happy, healthy and engaged workforce and business outcomes – including innovation, customer satisfaction and performance.
Meet Emma and Ben
She leads a team of three marketing and communications professionals from our head office in Sydney.
Emma’s partner is a General Manager in our Real Estate Services team, overseeing the busy operations of a large commercial office tower.
In mid 2020 Emma and Ben proudly started their family with the birth of their son. Through our shared care parental leave model, Investa supported both Emma and Ben with paid parental leave to enable them both to spend quality time bonding with their child in those important early months.
Emma initially accessed 12 months of leave (including 16 weeks paid leave), accessing paid keeping in touch days to stay connected with her manager and team. Ben was able to support Emma in those early weeks at home with their son, taking four weeks leave. Emma, Ben and their baby were regular guests at our Keeping in Touch lunches, where they shared stories with other Investa parents about the joys and challenges of family life!
With some exciting changes afoot in her team, Emma brought forward her return to work date. Investa supported her transition through a flexible work arrangement – returning two days per week, gradually moving to five days. At the same time, Ben took advantage of our shared-care parental leave model, now accessing his 16 weeks of fully paid parental leave to care for Louis and support Emma in her return to work.
Upon her return, Emma was promoted into her current role and took on expanded managerial and functional responsibility.
Investa is proud to support our working parents like Emma and Ben through our generous and inclusive parental leave benefits. We look forward to seeing them continue to thrive in their careers with our business.
"Investa is a people business, with the diversity of our people and inclusivity of our culture being among our greatest strengths. Recognition as a family friendly workplace reinforces our ongoing commitment to providing genuine, holistic support to our people as they integrate their work and family priorities in a way that works for them. This is so important in ensuring that every Investa team member is empowered to deliver their best work and to enjoy a rewarding career with our business.
Now more than ever, it’s clear the positive impact that supporting working families can have on enabling our communities to thrive. We’re passionate about doing everything we can to contribute to this positive societal change – for today and tomorrow.”
