Steps towards equal parenting and a family-friendly working life

2026-07-22

In Finland, reconciliation of paid employment and childcare responsibilities is supported with family policies including parental leave rights with relatively generous benefits, and universal, affordable and high-quality early childhood education and care services. The parental leave scheme was reformed in 2022 in order to promote gender equality and to better take into account family diversity. The education level and labour market participation of women is high. However, many obstacles towards gender equality still pertain as discrimination of women during and after pregnancy is not uncommon. The project CARE4CAREER is a national project with EU-wide relevance. It is coordinated by the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health (Tyoterveyslaitos), and supported by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, and Mothers in Business, a non-profit organization and a network for career-oriented mothers. The overall objective of the project is to tackle inequalities in reconciling paid employment and childcare through challenging gender stereotypes, raising awareness of support systems, and promoting transformation towards more family-friendly working life. It promotes a gender-transformative approach and challenges gender stereotypes in all its actions by providing practical, diversity checked tools and inspiring examples to make change. The specific objectives are: - to increase the adoption of family-friendly practices in the workplace and produce higher quality equality plans; - to increase the more even distribution of family leave within families by dismantling gender stereotypes and roles; - to raise public awareness of the impact of pregnancy and family leave discrimination; - to provide support, guidance, and information about their legal rights for the victims of the discrimination; - to share information on the impacts of the Finnish family leave reform and experiences of its implementation at the workplace level.

Finland

2025-10-15