Below are some short case studies – further examples from EfC member organisations are invited – to help bring to life the art of the possible! We hope this will inspire other members to think about how they can use carer related data to improve business performance and employee experience.

‘Supporting carers in the workplace’ (Centrica and Carers UK, 2019)

Without support, employees who are balancing caring with working can struggle to perform well in the workplace or – even worse – drop out of the workforce altogether, resulting in the loss of experienced and skilled staff. We know this disproportionately impacts females and those who are aged 45 and over. We also appreciate that nobody plans to be a carer, and your life can be changed overnight.

Adopting carer-friendly policies and practices can help address this, keeping valuable skills and expertise in the workforce and increasing productivity. So supporting employees with caring responsibilities isn’t just the right thing to do – it’s also something that makes good business sense, and helps companies meet the productivity challenge outlined in the government’s Industrial Strategy.

To help prove the business case for carer-friendly workplaces, we’ve recently calculated the financial saving made by supporting our people with a flexible carer policy and peer support:

• Estimated saving of £1.8 million a year by avoiding unplanned absences and presenteeism (working while unwell or not fully performing) due to caring responsibilities.
• Further cumulative savings of £1.3 million through increased retention by supporting colleagues to stay in work while they care for loved ones.

A study* of over 200 British businesses highlighted some of the benefits experienced by employers who supported carers in the workplace:

• 92% saw better staff retention
• 88% experienced lower absence
• 69% observed higher productivity
• 61% witnessed improved recruitment

*Employers for Carers/Carers UK/HM Government (2013) ‘Supporting Working Carers: The Benefits to Families, Business and the Economy’

How TSB monitors and measures carer data in the workplace (October, 2024)

“The more we know about our colleagues, the more appropriate support we can put in place to make sure our policies and processes are inclusive, helping us ensure that TSB is a place where everyone feels welcome. All colleagues are encouraged to complete diversity data which includes disclosure of being a carer within our HR system. Colleagues with caring responsibilities can also let us know by speaking with their manager.

“We regularly review the demographic of our colleagues who have recognised themselves as a carer and/or taken carers leave which has been logged on the HR system. This helps us understand if we have the right support in place and helps inform any future enhancements or changes to the support available.

“developed a Carers Dashboard in 2025 which enables us to have daily access to carer data.

“The types of data we look at are –

• What percentage of colleagues have disclosed as being a carer.
• The total number of hours of carers leave taken.
• The percentage of carer colleagues who have taken carers leave.
• Carer demographics such as age, gender, location, role, business area, retention and tenure.
• We regularly connect with our carers network to hear their feedback on the support available.
• We launched KareHero support – an adult care concierge service in January 2025.  Every quarter we look at how many carers are using this service and what support they need at an aggregate level.

“Example of data analysis approach – What percentage of colleagues have disclosed as being a carer

“We evaluate the percentage of our colleagues who have disclosed themselves as being a carer every 3 months as a minimum. There will be additional times throughout the year such as Carers Week, Carers Rights Day or external events, that we want to share the most up to date data.

“We share this data with our Leadership Teams, Colleagues and externally to increase awareness of the number of our colleagues who have caring responsibilities and the importance of the ongoing support that is in place. We look at the annual trends since launch, which showed a steady increase up until the end of last year when we saw a slight reduction.

“We analyse the data to understand the trends alongside other activity across the business and this helps inform our ongoing approach.”

EfC always welcomes other examples from member organisations to add to this page, either from an organisational or individual (carer) perspective, to help illustrate what can be done here. If you would like to contribute, please email efcdigital@carersuk.org.

What is productivity?

Besides the general top line definition of “the total output produced per input”, the CIPD (Chartered Institute of Personnel Development) suggests that: “Productivity can be thought of as how effectively organisations, and the people working in them, produce value from individual and collective contributions” and that “there is an untapped potential to boost productivity by raising the quality of people management across all sectors.” Its recommendations for employers include to:

• Use workforce data to improve diversity and inclusion. This is good business practice, boosts innovation, and enhances the organisation’s ability to serve a diverse customer base.
• Develop the people management capability of all line managers. They play a vital part in boosting employee engagement and well-being, as well as improving diversity and inclusion.
• Develop key policies and practices central to motivating staff. These include both direct and indirect employee voice, conflict management, work-life balance, and training and career development.

Tracking productivity

Tracking productivity – including identifying factors related to work-life balance and caring – can be challenging in practice and every organisation will have their own approach and strategies for capturing data. There is no right or wrong way for this process, therefore it may be whatever suits the shape and culture of your organisation.

• One definition of tracking productivity, for example, is “the process of capturing and analysing day-to-day work activities with the purpose of identifying patterns, barriers and opportunities improvements in the way employees get work done.”
• For instance, for a recent (2022) UK pilot with employers on introducing a 4 day working week, admin data, survey data, interviews and measures of work-life balance were used and data collected including revenue, absenteeism, resignations and new hires.

Metrics contributing to productivity included: communication and collaboration, time management, processes (meetings etc) and health and wellbeing.

Employer measures included: process and workflows, collaboration, focus periods, staff absences, tracking burnout, revenue and upskilling managers.

Employee measures included: health and wellbeing, stress, tracking leave and sickness and time management.