Source: benefitscanada.com
While Canadian culture has long been described as a mosaic, employers’ holiday policies are more likely to tie statutory holidays to Christian celebrations than reflect the country’s true multicultural identity.
In 2022, to better support an increasingly diverse workforce in both Canada and the U.S., Victoria-based software company Redbrick formalized its policy of allowing employees to take personal significance days in lieu of stat holidays throughout the year.
Christine Tatham, vice-president of people and culture at Redbrick, says the program is based, in part, on feedback from employees who weren’t always able to celebrate religious and cultural occasions that fall outside of traditional stat holidays. Since the program’s implementation, several employees have chosen to work on the stat holiday during long weekends in order to take a different day off.
“We’re really allowing them to have time with their family. For example, people who don’t celebrate Easter, having that time off really wasn’t of any personal benefit to them. . . . We have a very diverse team here at Redbrick — there are people from all different backgrounds working [in our offices] across Canada and the U.S.”