14 DAY TRIAL // Last year news came out that two of Silicon Valley’s tech companies, namely Apple and Facebook, had come up with a rather peculiar offer for their women employees.
The two tech giants put forward the irrefutable proposal of freezing the eggs of female workers, in their attempt to show that their health programs are designed to meet everyone’s needs. Facebook announced that it would offer $20,000 (£13,000) for egg-freezing.
It was then assumed that the controversial change was particularly aimed at attracting more employees within the company by putting forward a series of advantages that they would not be able to find elsewhere.
The offer was bound to meet some criticism
However, many claimed that the initiative was in fact meant to somehow put off women’s decision to have children in order to increase the corporation’s profit. Postponing childbearing intentions indefinitely was considered the reason behind the strange decision.
In a recent interview with Bloomberg, Richard Branson, commonly known as the founder of Virgin Group, defended the initiative and expressed his astonishment at all the criticism that it had received. He stated that, no matter what the company had put forward, it was still a woman’s choice whether she wanted to carry on with her career or whether she wanted to concentrate more on her family life and have a child.
Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s COO, who was also interviewed alongside Branson, said that what lays at the foundation of this decision was the story of a Facebook female employee. The woman in question had been diagnosed with cancer, and she had come forward to the COO to talk to her about her decision to carry on with the treatment.
What she worried about the most was the fact that because of the treatment that she was about to undergo, she wouldn't have been able to pursue her dream of having a child.
She had also expressed her desire to freeze her eggs but had mentioned that she did not dispose of the financial means to do it, given that the company's medical care did not cover the expenses.
The woman had come forward to the COO in search of advice, and this is how the idea of the company to take care of the bill for egg-freezing for all female employees came to life.