In this episode of MOVE Like This, Shannon Stone-Winding, President and CEO of the Business Alliance of Colleges and Employers (BACE), joins Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk to talk about caregiving as an organizational challenge that reaches far beyond the “sandwich generation.” Shannon is co-leading new research with the AICPA on caregiving among accounting professionals, work that started with a single story at a diversity conference: a firm that quietly reassigned a client relationship so an employee didn’t have to travel somewhere they didn’t feel safe, without putting that employee’s path to partner at risk.
Shannon brings both research and twenty years of personal experience to the conversation. She has been the primary caregiver for her husband, a 100% service-connected disabled Marine Corps veteran, since his diagnosis two decades ago. That experience shapes her central point: caregiving doesn’t look like what most firms assume. It includes early-career employees supporting younger siblings while finishing a degree, children who become caregivers themselves, and chosen family who take on caregiving roles with no formal recognition at all.
The conversation turns to what firms can actually do about it. Shannon argues caregiving support belongs in crisis management planning, not just benefits policy, and that silence around caregiving is usually less about privacy and more about fear it will cost someone their shot at leadership. Her challenge to firm leaders: stop treating caregiving as the exception that gets special handling, and start treating it as the rule most of the workforce is already living.
Key Takeaways:
- Caregiving Is Broader Than Many Firms Realize: It isn’t limited to women raising young children. Employees may be caring for children, parents, siblings, partners, friends, or others, and those responsibilities can change throughout a career.
- Caregiving Is a Retention and Leadership Issue: When professionals can’t reconcile work expectations with caregiving responsibilities, firms risk losing experienced people who might otherwise become future leaders.
- Commitment Isn’t the Problem: Caregivers may be just as ambitious and committed as their peers, but they are managing competing demands on their time and energy. Assuming caregiving signals less career ambition can have real consequences.
- Flexibility Requires Trust and Culture, Not Just Policies: Flexible work only helps when employees can actually use it without worrying that doing so will affect how their commitment, performance, or leadership potential is perceived.
- Firms Need to Understand What They Can’t See: Employees may not disclose caregiving responsibilities, particularly if they fear being judged differently. Leaders need to ask, listen, and become more curious about experiences that aren’t immediately visible.
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