OFF-RAMPS AND ON-RAMPS℠ Strategic Advisory Service
Strategies of "reattachment," programs and policies to enhance a company's ability to reach out and welcome women who have recently off-ramped from mainstream careers.

EXTREME JOBS℠ Strategic Advisory Service
Strategies to contain stress and overload enhance a company's ability to sustain high performance among key talent.

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In early 2004 we launched “Hidden Brain Drain” — a private sector Task Force which is focused on policies that realize female and minority talent over the lifespan. The Task Force will both examine key policy challenges and develop a second generation of policy and practice with enough heft and traction to drive change. The Task Force now has 36 global corporate members representing over 2.5 million employees, operating in 152 countries around the world and is led by co-chairs from an impressive roster of companies – American Express, Booz Allen Hamilton, Ernst & Young, General Electric, Goldman Sachs, Johnson and Johnson, Lehman Brothers, and Time Warner.

The Task Force has had both enormous research impact and spawned 18 models of best practice around the world—highlighted in Sylvia Hewlett’s book Off-Ramps and On-Ramps: Keeping Talented Women on the Road to Success (Harvard Business School Press, 2007). In addition, the Harvard Business Review has published three articles over the last two years including “Leadership in Your Midst” and “Extreme Jobs: The Dangerous Allure of the 70-Hour Workweek.” This research has struck a nerve: media coverage includes articles in the Financial Times, New York Times, International Herald Tribune, Business Week, and Time magazine and appearances on The Today Show, ABC World News and the BBC.

Task Force Members

Important work has been done to understand the benefits of— and to advocate for—more flexible, people-friendly workplaces. Much of that work has concentrated on large businesses. Indeed, large companies are able to take advantage of economies of scale and have entire departments who can take responsibility for managing and implementing workplace policies.

The main goal of this project is to explore work-life issues in small businesses and to craft a substantial menu of policies that ease the challenge for small business employees and improve retention and productivity for small business employers. Though small companies are constrained in their ability to offer or manage costly benefits and programs, we are convinced that they also face a special set of opportunities. For one, a small business can much more readily transition a culture to one that embraces flexibility. Ultimately, with this project we aim to uncover a collection of work-life recommendations and policies that small businesses can implement at little or no cost.