05-26-2026SUBSCRIBER EXCLUSIVE

Punished for parental leave: How generous leave policies can be a trap for working mothers

Great leave policies attract great employees. Then they try to use it. . . . That’s when the trouble starts for too many moms (and dads).

[Source images: Adobe Stock]

Mita Mallick was barely a month into her parental leave when she got a call from a friend. “I’m thinking she’s calling to check in on me, and we’re having a nice conversation,” Mallick recounts. Then she asked a question that took Mallick by surprise: So are you not going back to work?Her friend revealed that Mallick’s employer—a large, recognizable public company with a generous five-month leave policy—had posted her job. “I felt like the floor fell out from under me,” Mallick says. “I was just devastated and felt so betrayed.”Before going on leave, Mallick had already lost out on a promotion that failed to materialize once she became pregnant. She started looking for another job—while freshly postpartum—and never ended up returning to that company.A few years later, when Mallick was having another baby, she was more prepared. She was up for a promotion and hid her pregnancy for as long as possible. When she was eventually forced to........

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