Organisations
My programs are designed for you if you represent
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A multinational company: your staff are frequent business travellers or go on long term assignments. Their partners and children do not accompany them. Research shows that staff can experience role and time strain connected to being torn between work and family life. They can experience more stress leading to physical and mental health issues.
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A humanitarian organisation: your staff are posted in high-risk environments. They are often away from their immediate families, sometimes for months at a time. They face potential mental health struggles and risk burnout as they pour themselves out to serve others. They struggle to keep in touch with their children and their spouse carries the parenting burden alone, their personal relationships suffer.
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A diplomatic foreign service family support service: For some overseas postings, partners and children cannot accompany your member of staff on location. You may be struggling to recruit for these more risky positions or requests for early transfer are more frequent than in other positions.
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As an academic institution you host many visiting academics who move without their spouses and children: They struggle to really fit into the country and culture. They suffer from loneliness and homesickness.
Recruitment, retention and staff wellbeing are rarely tracked within organisations according to the criteria of whether the member of staff is on an unaccompanied posting or on frequent business travels. Yet research clearly demonstrates that there is additional stress created for the staff member by these specific work demands, leading them to resort to sometimes unhealthy coping strategies. Their spouse also has increased demands and stress imposed on them.
Although your organisation may provide financial compensation to a certain extent and families agree to these postings, providing tangible support on this particular requirement of the job would make all the difference not only in the improvement of staff well-being (less sick leave and long-term mental health issues) but also to the willingness of highly-skilled and experienced staff to stay in post or be sent to difficult locations.
In fact, providing the right resources and support will not only contribute to increasing your employer branding but also the employees’ commitment and engagement with your organisation.
Here are the different ways we can work together to support your staff on split family assignments:
These include:
- Briefings for supervisors on specific stressors of staff on unaccompanied postings
- Workshops for spouses and staff on reconnecting after time apart, parenting together and preparing for emergencies and crisis situations.
- Workshops for ‘stay-behind’ partners on common challenges experienced during a split family assignment and research backed strategies to make it work for them
- Tailor-made workshops according to your organisation’s needs
The “APART BUT TOGETHER” program is the resource center to help split location families.
Participants will have lifetime access to research based strategies and resources designed to strengthen the five pillars that create a strong and happy family unit even when living apart:
- Pillar 1: Personal Wellbeing and Development
- Pillar 2: Strong Partnership
- Pillar 3: Parenting
- Pillar 4: Smooth Transitions
- Pillar 5: Emergencies & dangerous locations
- Bonus: Preparing for a split family assignment
They will also have access to:
- 6 monthly group calls to get answers to their questions and inspiration
- 1x 30 Min one-on-one call with me for personalised support
- A free copy of my book 'Holding the Fort Abroad'
- Possibility to add on demand individual sessions
If you are an organisation that sends staff on overseas postings. Some of these postings are unaccompanied, meaning that their partner and children cannot relocate with them.
The research I do on split family assignments delves into the challenges and outcomes faced by individuals undertaking tasks or missions alone, particularly in contexts like diplomatic missions, business expatriation, or humanitarian work assignments.
It also seeks to highlight how families and individuals make being geographically apart work.
Such studies are crucial for developing policies and support systems to ensure the well-being and effectiveness of individuals on unaccompanied assignments.
❓ Do you know how this is affecting your staff?
❓ Are you noticing more difficulty in recruiting for these positions?
❓ Are you losing highly skilled workers because their families give them an ultimatum?
I can provide tailored research for your company on the impact of split family assignments and guidance to improve staff support.
Individual sessions support a successful split family international assignment!
Sessions can be 1:2 as the couple decide whether to agree to only one of them relocating abroad. This can be done without divulging any contractual details. I will help them ask the right questions, what is important for them and how to make it work for the staff relocating, the partner and children staying behind.
Once the decision has been taken, I will help them prepare so that:
➡️ the family is fully onboard and does not change their minds
➡️ emergencies do not curtail the assignment unnecessarily.
You can also offer 1:1 ongoing support sessions to the partner of the staff who is relocating abroad. This sends a strong signal that you care about your staff member. Their mind will be at ease that pressure on the remaining spouse is manageable.
Take the first step towards enhancing your employer branding and increasing your employees’ engagement in split family assignments.
Schedule an introduction call where we will:
- Gain a comprehensive understanding of the unique needs and challenges of your employees and organisation.
- Define the areas where you want to focus and how I can support you best.
Hi, my name is Rhoda.
I am a specialist in split family assignments and frequent business travel and their impact on family life. I help parents manage the stress and disconnect from living this life so that they can enjoy the growth and intention this lifestyle can bring.
International organisations (foreign service, military, humanitarian and private organisations) are increasingly aware of the specific requirements for staff and their families when on non-family duty stations. Through talks and workshops, I help organisations, such as the World Food Program, support their employees when they are regularly sent on international assignments from a month to a couple of years without their partners and children.
Having experienced both frequent work travel and a split family assignment from the point of view of the ‘holding the fort partner’, I have developed research based strategies to ensure that families can thrive and be “together even when geographically apart”.
I am regularly invited to share about the challenges, pitfalls of living as a family with a partner absent for work and I share insights into what can be done to live this life successfully on podcasts such as Nomadic Diaries and ‘Where Are You From? And Other Ridiculous Questions’. I am also part of the Global Family Library by Expat Valley.
