Women, and especially mothers, can face distinct financial and career challenges in the workplace. Those challenges can affect everything from day-to-day financial security to the ability to remain in the workforce and advance in a career. For employers, that raises an important question: Are your workplace benefits addressing the needs that can have the greatest impact on women’s financial well-being?
Recent research suggests there may be room for improvement. In a 2026 survey of more than 2,200 U.S. working parents, Pew Research Center found that 62% of full-time working mothers said it was difficult to balance work and family responsibilities, compared with 47% of fathers. At the same time, 45% of working parents said being a parent makes it harder to advance at work.
Benefits and workplace flexibility may help address some of these challenges. Pew found that 71% of working parents said the ability to work from home or choose when to work their required hours would be highly helpful, yet only about one-quarter said they currently have that flexibility. Onsite childcare also stood out as an unmet need: 43% of working parents said it would be highly helpful, rising to 59% among those with a child age 5 or younger, but only 6% said it was available at their workplace.
For employers, this highlights the importance of looking beyond traditional compensation and retirement benefits. Paid leave, childcare support, flexible work arrangements, and financial wellness resources may all help employees manage financial and family responsibilities. Employers that regularly evaluate whether their benefits meet the needs of their workforce may be better positioned to support women, particularly mothers, while also supporting broader goals around retention and engagement.
Key Points
• Extended parental leave can help mothers maintain their career trajectory.
• Creating advancement opportunities for women through education, mentorships, and coaching can help close the gender gap.
• Addressing the childcare crisis is crucial for working mothers, reducing both financial and emotional stress.
• Employee-sponsored returnship programs offer valuable re-entry options for women.
• Financial wellness benefits are essential for women’s overall well-being, helping them manage debt and reduce financial stress.
What Employers Can Do
Employers have made progress toward creating more equitable workplaces, but women and mothers can still face financial and work challenges that affect their ability to remain in the workforce and advance their careers. Benefits can be one way employers address some of these challenges.
Rather than taking a one-size-fits-all approach, employers can consider whether their benefits packages reflect the needs of their workforce, including the needs of working parents and caregivers. Expanding or adjusting benefits may help employees manage financial pressures, work and family responsibilities, and other challenges that can affect their overall financial well-being.
Here are some strategies employers may want to consider.
Recommended: Measuring the Financial Well-Being of Your Workforce
Rethink Maternity Leave
The more paid parental leave your firm can offer, generally the better. Some companies are expanding leave for birthing parents beyond 12 weeks, offering as much as 26 weeks. Others are providing additional weeks of paid leave to parents of newborns who spend time in the neonatal intensive care unit.
A generous paid parental leave program not only helps attract female workers but also increases the likelihood that your existing women employees will return to their jobs after having or adopting a child, as opposed to dropping out of the workforce —- and leaving you with a new opening to fill.
Another question to consider is whether your parental leave policies apply to all types of families and parents, such as non-birth mothers, foster parents, and parents who use surrogates. Parental benefits provide an opportunity for building your inclusive benefits strategy.
Create Real Opportunities for Advancement
For every 100 entry-level men promoted to management, 93 women are promoted, according to the Women in the Workplace 2025 report by McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.org. The study also revealed that women only hold 29% of C-suite roles. With less opportunities for advancement, many women leave their employers for better opportunities elsewhere.
One way to counter this trend is to offer female employees a path to advancement through education opportunities. You might do this by offering tuition assistance programs and/or access to free (or discounted) training and certification programs. This can help female employees get ahead in their careers, earn more and, in turn, achieve greater financial stability. It can also propel women into the roles of the future where they are currently underrepresented, like data science, software development, and engineering.
Other initiatives that can improve female career mobility include: formal mentorships, sponsorships, women’s employee resource groups (ERGs), leadership circles, and career coaching workshops. If your company offers these programs, you’ll want to make sure women employees know about and have easy access to them.
Address the Childcare Crisis
The high cost and limited availability of childcare continue to create an impediment for women to fully participate in the workforce. Employers can help address childcare challenges in several ways. On-site childcare is the most accommodating benefit. But on-site care is a big investment of infrastructure and resources that realistically only a small group of major employers can provide.
One alternative is to offer some type of emergency or backup child care support. Some companies do this by partnering with local daycare facilities and providing access to free or discounted childcare when a regular provider falls through. Other firms are offering employees stipends for online care networks, such as Care.com and SeekingSitters.com, that provide access to sitters at short notice.
Being open to and evaluating childcare support can be particularly important if you are mandating, or simply encouraging, employees to work onsite.
Consider Returnships
Many women who take time off to care for young children (or aging parents) want to return to work but find the gaps in their resumes and lack of current skills are holding them back.
To help address this issue, some companies are offering “returnships.” Pioneered by finance leaders Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, these are internship programs that give returning caregivers the opportunity to brush up their skills or learn new ones. Returnships typically run for a few months, offering training, experience, and networking opportunities to workers — often women — who’ve been out of the workforce for an extended period of time.
Returnship programs not only give women who dropped out of the workforce a viable onramp, they also give employers a way to vet talent before making an official hire.
Address Student Debt
Student loan debt impacts nearly 43 million Americans and a disproportionate number are female. According to EducationData.org, women hold approximately 60% of all outstanding student debt and take an average of two years longer to pay off their student loans. Women also owe more in graduate student loan debt than men, except in professional doctorate degrees.
Student debt can have a negative impact on any employee’s financial (and overall) well-being. As a result, a growing number of employers are offering student loan repayment benefits, which may be particularly beneficial to female employees. Currently, employers can offer up to $5,250 in tax-exempt student loan repayment benefits. Companies can also provide employees with a match on their retirement plans for making student loan payments. This can be a stand-alone offering, or part of a broader employee benefits program.
Offer Flexible, Women-Friendly Financial Wellness Benefits
Financial wellness benefits can give employees tools to manage immediate financial pressures while working toward longer-term goals. Employers can consider whether their offerings are flexible enough to meet the different needs and circumstances of their workforce, including women and working parents.
Options may include emergency savings programs, debt-management resources, retirement planning, tuition assistance, and financial education. Employers can also consider how benefits such as paid leave, flexible work arrangements, and caregiving support may complement financial wellness programs by helping employees manage work and family responsibilities.
Rather than creating separate benefits for women, employers can use employee feedback and workforce data to identify gaps in their existing offerings and make benefits more accessible and relevant. A broader range of flexible benefits can give all employees more options for addressing their financial and workplace needs.
Recommended: The Future of Financial Well-Being in the Workplace
The Takeaway
Women are a vital part of any employer’s workforce. Benefits packages designed to address women’s specific needs can help employers attract and retain talented female employees. They can also help guarantee women, especially moms, have access to an equal playing field and a secure financial future.
SoFi at Work offers employers the benefits platform, education resources, and financial counseling that can help you assemble packages that help you increase employee productivity, loyalty, and overall well-being.
Photo credit: iStock/jacoblund
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