Employees of Facebook who fall victim to domestic violence or sexual assault will be able to avail up to 20 days of additional paid leave. This new policy will apply to all employees of Facebook, across the globe, as per an announcement by Sheryl Sandberg, COO, Facebook, on social media.
Even if an employee’s family member or any other household member is a victim of domestic abuse or violence, the employee can avail paid leave to take care of them. The policy does not require the concerned employees to produce any police report or formal proof or documentation to avail the leave.
Earlier, Facebook offered unpaid leave to employees in the US who were victims of domestic violence and sexual assault .
A Bloomberg report says that all employee need to do to avail this emergency leave is to confide in their managers, who will be identified as victims in the internal database, which will be visible onto to the human resource managers.
The reason behind the introduce of the policy is apparently the rising cases of domestic violence during the pandemic. Facebook feels it is the duty of corporates to ensure that they help their employees who have faced abuse or violence at home, and even during times of illness and stress.
Facebook has also rolled out a new corporate human rights policy, for the workforce, globally, to all of the social network and has also initiated a fund to support human rights defenders. The new policy will outline the standard Facebook will attempt to keep up in terms of international law, including the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs).
