There are periods in life when work doesn’t come first. Whether to care for ourselves or a family member, or even serve a civic duty, sometimes we need time away from work.
Managing leave is an elemental part of ensuring your employees are well cared for and a core part of any human resources function. But with the potential for staffing gaps, compliance with federal and state laws, questions about who is eligible for what and when, and concerns about how pay and benefits are handled, managing leave can be one of the most complicated aspects of human resource management.
Here’s a primer on the various types of leaves of absence, who is eligible, and how to communicate company policies to employees.
What Is a Leave of Absence?
A leave of absence is a company-permitted extended break from work due to specific, often extraordinary, circumstances. Depending on federal, state, and local laws — and company policies — a leave of absence may be paid, often referred to as “income replacement,” or not, known as an unpaid leave of absence.
Employees may take leave to care for their own serious health condition or that of a family member, to bond with a new child, to grieve the loss of a loved one, or to report for military service, among other reasons.
Leaves of absence differ from general employee leave, including paid time off (PTO), sick days, or vacation time. These categories are a set allotment that can vary by tenure but are offered to every employee, while leaves of absence are approved and granted on a case-by-case basis.
Categories of Leave
Leave is complicated, but one way to think of it is by dividing it into legally-protected and voluntary leave. Protected and voluntary leaves of absence can both be either paid or unpaid leave. Below, we’ll dive into the various categories.
Legally-Protected Leave
These types of employee leave are legally protected by federal, state, or even local law for eligible employees. Companies must grant this leave to employees and preserve their job for them while they are out.
Protected leave most commonly falls under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA), or the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Leave for jury duty is also protected, but since employees usually don’t need much time off for jury duty, it is less of a concern when managing longer-term leave.
Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA)
FMLA leave ensures 12 workweeks of job-protected leave for eligible employees during a 12-month period of time. This leave covers reasons including the birth of a child, adoption or start of foster care, or caring for an immediate family member with a serious health condition. The Family and Medical Leave Act does not require companies to pay employees during leave but, critically, does ensure that employees maintain their group health insurance benefits during their time away.
FMLA leave often runs concurrently with individual company plans that offer paid leave for employees who are taking FMLA leave for parental leave. Caregiver leave is also covered under FMLA but usually does not include an income replacement benefit by the employer.
Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA)
USERRA is a federal law that governs military service leave. “USERRA provides job protection and protection of benefits for folks who need to serve in the military,” said Sharona Abramson, founder of Inflection Point Total Rewards, a total rewards consulting company. USERRA also ensures the continuation of benefits for the service member’s dependents.
Under this law, service members have the right to be reemployed in their job or the job they would have been eligible for had they not been on leave for military duty. USERRA also mandates that employers make reasonable efforts to help a returning service member qualify for reemployment — efforts which can include training, retraining, or upskilling the returning individual.
Disability Leave
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires employers with at least 15 employees to make “reasonable accommodations” for employees with a disability. Such accommodations may mean amending existing leave policies for an individual with a disability and granting them an extended period off of work.
Short-term disability may also be invoked for employees who recently gave birth, especially if their company does not have a paid parental leave policy. “Childbirth can be considered eligible for short-term disability,” said Emily Goodson, a disability inclusion consultant. “If your company does not provide paid parental leave, you very well could have options through your state or through short-term disability,” she added.
Long-term disability also exists as a resource for employees facing a debilitating medical condition or injury that will prevent them from working for a long period. Though job protection is not assured under long-term disability, financial assistance may be provided. You can find information on long-term disability insurance and eligibility on the Social Security Administration website.
Jury Duty
Time off to serve as a juror is mandated by law in most states, but may be required at the local level, too. Generally, the leave is unpaid, although some jurisdictions may require employers to pay employees.
Voluntary Leave
Referred to as “voluntary” because there’s no legally mandated job protection aspect of it, this form of leave is an employee benefit offered by companies at their discretion. Although we’re referring to it here as voluntary to delineate it from protected leave, competitive employers support voluntary leave.
Companies most often offer leaves of absence to ensure employees who have used their paid time off are still able to take the time off they need to care for themself or others.
Common Types of Voluntary Leave
- Bereavement Leave: This leave type allows individuals time to mourn the loss of a family member or loved one. Increasingly, companies are covering miscarriage in their bereavement leave policies as well.
- Paid Parental Leave: Modern companies that emphasize equity grant both parents equal amounts of parental leave time.
- Personal Leave: This time away from work can be requested to support a number of delicate situations in an individual’s life.
- Sick Leave: Sick leave may be covered under FMLA for eligible companies and individuals, but many companies will have their own specific policies as well.
- Sabbatical: This is most often a perk offered after a specific length of tenure at a company, though the timeframe differs by organization.
How to Create Your Own Leave Policy
The best leave policies comply with all applicable laws while serving the needs of the company and making employees feel cared for.
1. Stay compliant.
Ensure the company is complying with all applicable laws across various jurisdictions. Yes, adhering to FMLA and ADA is necessary, but make sure you’re well versed in all governing laws as these exist across federal, state, and local regulations.
For example, while your business is not federally required to provide paid parental leave, some states require it. California is one such state, and its Paid Family Leave program provides up to eight weeks of partial wage replacement benefits.
You should also consider international requirements. If you work for a multinational company, lawyers can help you ensure your business is meeting leave laws in the areas in which it operates.
2. Consider what matters to your company.
Your leave of absence policies are an actionable and effective way to demonstrate your commitment to employee wellbeing. This means going beyond perfunctory offerings — like allowing bereavement leave only for the death of an immediate family member — and expanding into more nuanced leave policies.
“I’ve seen employers get caught up in the details without considering the human,” said Nadia Eran, a fractional head of people and people ops leader for Series A through C startups. “The best kinds of policies demonstrate compassion and create space for dialogue.”
3. Create clear policies, especially around pay and benefits.
Well-considered, documented policies are essential to avoid confusion, resentment, and a lack of compliance — especially when it comes to pay and benefits. Leaves of absence can make pay complicated, even more so when an employee receives performance-based compensation, like bonuses or commissions.
“You want to avoid a situation when an employee says, ‘Because I had that surgery and was out for three months, am I not eligible for my bonus even though I hit all my goals?” said Eran.
Ambiguity creates unfairness, or the perception of it, so create detailed policies and apply them universally. Ultimately, companies should think about what will best serve them long term. “At the end of the day, you want to think about retention. Would you rather have an employee returning to the company who is feeling salty because their pay has been impacted by a health condition or one who is proud to work at a company that supports them on their journey?” asked Eran.
Best Practices for Managing Leave
Managing leave isn’t just about the specifics of compensation or the continuation of benefits (although that’s important). Companies must also prioritize communicating with employees, planning for upcoming leave, and supporting employees when they return to work.
Communication
Simply put, a leave of absence is for when employees need support. “A good leave policy shows employees you understand that in certain times work doesn't always come first,” said Eran.
Yet, in order for employees to make a leave of absence request, they need to know what is offered. This means transparent communication in easy-to-access documents that clearly outline employee eligibility. Avoid “wrapping leave policies in legalese and making them difficult to find,” Eran advised.
Rather, HR should detail leave entitlement and policies in the employee handbook, and store that in a searchable format, whether that’s Notion, Google Docs, or your human resources information system (HRIS). Additionally, be sure to dedicate time to discussing policies during onboarding and again each year during open enrollment.
While they don’t need to fill HR’s role or play therapist, managers are also key here. With HR’s guidance, managers should understand the tools available to employees and work to stay in tune with their team, Eran said. “That way, when a manager hears an employee say they are caring for a sick parent, they can let employees know ‘Hey, we actually have family leave that could be applicable to you,’” she added.
Proactive Leave Planning
Effective leave planning starts with treating the leave like offboarding. “Looking at a leave of absence as a true offboarding allows the company to fully document all the roles and responsibilities that person has, and make sure we have someone to cover each of those projects, functions, and tasks, so no gap occurs,” said Eran.
She recommends using a “brain dump template,” an offboarding template where the individual can fully document all the tasks they handle, big and small. Then, share that document with their manager and any other stakeholders involved before the individual goes on leave. “That way, people can make sure they know what this task really looks like, are sure they can access the right docs, etc.,” she noted.
If you realize you do have a gap, companies can take advantage of fractional support, temp agencies, or — depending on workload — reassign roles across the team. Lastly, have the individual taking leave shadow their replacement for the last week. That way, the person shouldering their responsibilities is already the primary owner, and the leave-bound employee can support them where needed.
Put the same level of care into [reintegration] as you would somebody starting with an organization for the first time.
Return-to-Work Protocols
Companies, especially growing ones, change quickly, and a multi-month leave of absence often means an employee is coming back to a job and a company that may both feel new. Treating a departing employee’s leave as offboarding means they are prepared for onboarding when they return.
“To reintegrate an individual into the company after leave, look at it like onboarding, and put the same level of care into it as you would somebody starting with an organization for the first time,” said Goodson. “Having already put them through offboarding helps them understand there’s an on-ramp to return,” she added.
As employees readjust to work, identify and amplify the resources available to them, like employee resource groups (ERGs). As Eran noted, “ERGs — whether for parents, for military service members, or caregivers — can be really helpful for a person coming back.”
Tech and Tools to Support Leave Management
Because of the complexity of the process and the compliance required, managing leave can be daunting. But technology can help human resources teams enormously here.
Say a company has eight employees all taking a leave of absence at the same time. Some may be using FMLA leave benefits, others are taking advantage of company policies for unpaid personal leave, while another is out on USERRA. HR is tasked with tracking deadlines, ensuring pay is correctly managed, and reporting on this. It’s a headache. Plus, manually tracking leave creates a greater likelihood of human error, noncompliance, and costly mistakes for the organization. That’s where HR tech can help.
“Leave is extremely complicated. At larger companies, there may be leave specialists, but at smaller companies most of the time it’s HR,” said Goodson. “When that’s the case, I recommend using an HRIS that supports leave management and working closely with your benefits broker or provider to ensure compliance. There's just a lot of complexities to the legality of different states and different paperwork involved,” she added.
How HRIS Tools Streamline Leave of Absence Management
Human resources information systems with leave management features simplify the process of requesting and approving leave. A good HRIS will track time off for each employee, monitor leave balances, and adjust based on geographical location to support compliance for employees across different states.
Ultimately, managing leave is a form of change management...HR systems are able to contain all the different elements required to streamline this.
“Technology facilitates the organization of the whole leave journey,” said Abramson. That’s because tracking milestones related to leave can help ensure consistency, compliance, and communication at the right intervals, she explained.
HRISs provide both quantitative metrics (payroll errors, compliance risk costs, unauthorized leave) and qualitative metrics (employee satisfaction, leave usage), enabling comprehensive leave reporting for HR teams and managers.
“Ultimately, managing leave is a form of change management: A person is leaving for X days, weeks, or months, and the organization has to adjust to accommodate this,” said Eran. “The most important thing for any change management process is communication, and HR systems are able to contain all the different elements required to streamline this,” she said. With an HRIS, managers can receive regular updates related to upcoming leave, while employees get reminders to ensure they’ve completed all of their offboarding tasks, for example.
Making Leave Easier With Lattice
Lattice HRIS streamlines leave requests, making it simpler for employees to submit and view their requests, while HR teams can track, approve, and report on requests with ease. Schedule a demo of Lattice HRIS today to learn more.
