Parag Agrawal, who became the new CEO of Twitter in November last year after replacing Jack Dorsey, has been on paternity leave after the birth of his second child, something which was publicly appreciated by other fathers as an important step towards normalising the practice.
While many have lauded the Twitter CEO's decision, some have opined that Agrawal’s paternity leave should have been longer and not just “a few weeks.”
Although the US is known to be stringent in granting maternity and paternity leaves, social media platform Twitter offers a generous 20 weeks of parental leave to its employees.
The 37-year-old Indian American's leave was announced last week by Twitter.
"At Twitter, we encourage and fully support employees taking parental leave in whatever way works best for each person," said Laura Yagerman, who is Twitter's head of corporate communications, the Washington Post reported.
Twitter’s chief financial officer, Ned Segal, tweeted, "I wish leaders did this when I was early in my career and becoming a father."
Reddit Inc co-founder Alexis Ohanian urged Agrawal to “take the time you need.” He tweeted on Thursday, 17 February, that parental leave can be split up and not necessarily need to be taken all at once.
He tweeted, "...you can split parental leave up, like take a few weeks to make sure everything at home is AOK, then take every Friday off to use the rest of the leave. You'll always be a text message away!"
Actor Anushka Sharma said it was about time paternity leave was normalised. She posted a screenshot of the news on Instagram and said "About time this is normalised."
Her husband, cricketer Virat Kohli, had also taken time off when their child Vamika was born in January last year.
Others commented on the importance of family time.
Additionally, Brenden Lee, who works for Twitter's corporate communications department, wrote on LinkedIn that he is "proud that Twitter and our CEO Parag Agrawal are leading the way here, ensuring ALL parents are able to take advantage of this most special time for their families."
Not the Norm in the US
According to the US Department of Labor, most American men take less than 10 days off the job when a new child arrives in the family.
There have been instances, however, of high-profile fathers taking leave from work after the birth of their children.
Meta CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, and Pete Buttigieg, the US transportation secretary, are some examples.
Buttigieg had to deal with a lot of public scrutiny for his decision.
Tucker Carlson, a widely watched Fox News host, told his audience, "Pete Buttigieg has been on leave from his job since August after adopting a child. Paternity leave, they call it, trying to figure out how to breastfeed – no word on how that went."
Buttigieg later reacted by saying that it was long past time to make it possible for every American mother and father to take care of a new child arriving in the family.
(With inputs from The Guardian and the Washington Post)
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