More companies offer new fathers more paid time off to spendwith their new baby and mom. The rub is that companies are having ahard time persuading dads to take advantage of the offer. TheWall Street Journal reported recently that Deloittesurveyed more than 1,000 US workers and one-in-three said theyworried that taking time off would jeopardize their careers, andmore than half said that if they used the parental-leave benefitsavailable to them it would be seen as a lack of commitment to thejob.

In another study by researchers at Ball State University andOhio State found that only 14% of fathers who take leave do so formore than 2 weeks. I found this interesting because there areclearly historical biases that influence the failure to takeadvantage of paternity leave benefits, but it is also a moresignificant issue. In the US taking time off is a challenge forexecutives because most expect that he or she will remain online,and time off beyond a week is often a real or perceived challenge.We should take a page from the European script where holidays are agiven and embraced by management.