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The UK's national charity for working parents and carers

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What does Flex mean to you?

In a flexible world, everyone works differently and for different reasons, and so for this year’s National Work Life Week, we’re asking people to share – what does flexible working mean to you? 

Tell us what flex means to you!

Working Families Parents and Carers Advisory Panel Role Profile

What is the Parents and Carers Advisory Panel? 

The panel is a group of parents and carers from across the UK who are working, or looking for work, alongside their caring responsibilities. Our panel members are crucially important to the work we do, contributing their life experience to help shape our policy work, collaborating on research that drives forward change, and being a voice to speak out for parents and carers. They do this through discussing issues, sharing experiences, telling their story and speaking to the media. 

Who is on the panel? 

We are particularly keen to have parents and carers who have recent lived experience of struggling to balance work and caring responsibilities. This might be due to employers’ inflexible work policies, being made redundant because of your responsibilities at home, having to manage insecure work and childcare, or discrimination because you were having a baby. 
 
We don’t expect you to have any formal qualifications, just a willingness to talk about your own experience. 

What will I do as a panel member? 

As part of the panel, there will be an opportunity to:  

  • Share your perspective as a working parent or carer at virtual meetings that will take place every other month. Sometimes the topics will be set by us, other times panel members can choose what is discussed.  
  • Keep up to date with our work and the wider news that impacts parents and carers with a regular newsletter 
  • Share your experience in a blog or a case study 
  • Speak to the media about your own experience, if you feel comfortable to do so. If you choose to do this, we’ll provide you with media training.  
  • Take part in academic research 
  • Test our services and give feedback on how they work for you 
  • Review our guidance and resources to make sure we get the tone right 
  • Attend Working Families events 

What are the benefits of taking part?  

We want being part of the panel to be a rewarding experience and for members to see the impact of their contributions. As a panel member you can: 

  • Meet other parents and carers who want to help remove the barriers that people face 
  • Develop skills in influencing and designing services 
  • Receive training on speaking to the media 
  • Share your own experience in a blog or as a case study 
  • Join Working Families events that celebrate our work and campaign for change 

When we meet in person we will reimburse all out of pocket expenses. 

How much time do you need? 

You will likely need to allow 2-4 hours every other month, including meetings and feedback requests. Where possible we will involve you outside of your usual working hours and we will try to take your availability into account. 
 
Panel membership is for a maximum of two years, giving an opportunity in that time to effect change and see an impact. You can leave the panel at any time. 

How to get involved

If you have any questions or would like to talk to someone about getting involved please email Anna Letouze.