Sharon Lurtsema, Founder and CEOFor millions of employees, the ability to perform at work is directly connected to what is happening at home. A sick child, an aging parent, an unexpected gap in care or the growing complexity of managing work and family responsibilities can quickly become a workforce issue.
For employers, that means caregiving is no longer simply a personal challenge. It is a productivity, engagement, retention and workforce strategy issue.
Corporate Care Solutions believes this shift presents an opportunity to rethink how family care benefits are designed, delivered and funded.
Built on a foundation of Backup Child Care and Adult/Elder Care, the company is expanding the possibilities of employer-sponsored family care through technology, care navigation, concierge services, flexible reimbursement programs and a national network of care providers.
At the center of the strategy is a simple idea: employees should be able to access care with ease, transparency and choice, while employers should pay for care when their employees actually use it.
That combination of human support, technology, flexibility and financial accountability is reshaping how employer-sponsored family care benefits can be delivered.
From Backup Care to a Broader Family Care Strategy
Backup Care solves an important and immediate problem: an employee’s regular care arrangement is unavailable and another solution is needed so that employee can remain at work.
But today’s employees face caregiving responsibilities that extend well beyond an occasional disruption.
They may be caring for young children, teenagers, aging parents, spouses or other loved ones, sometimes simultaneously. Their needs may range from an unexpected child care gap to finding ongoing elder care resources, arranging summer camp or simply managing the growing number of personal responsibilities competing for their time.
Corporate Care Solutions is building around that broader reality without losing sight of the essential role Backup Care plays.
“Family care benefits go beyond just Backup Care,” says Matt O’Connor, President and Chief Commercial Officer of Corporate Care Solutions. “Employees are dealing with ongoing and increasingly complex caregiving needs. Employers have an opportunity to support those employees in a much more comprehensive way.”
That philosophy is expanding what employers can provide through a single family care benefits relationship.
Alongside Backup Child Care and Adult/Elder Care, the company’s growing portfolio includes Daycare Reserve™, Care Pass™, Camp Reimbursement, My Choice™ Care and MyLife™ Concierge, giving employers multiple ways to support employees based on the needs of their workforce, their benefit strategy and their budget.
Rather than assuming one model of care will work for every family, Corporate Care Solutions is creating multiple pathways to support.
That flexibility is increasingly important for employers serving multigenerational and geographically dispersed workforces whose employees may have dramatically different care needs.
Bringing Consumer Technology to Employee Care
Technology has been part of the Corporate Care Solutions story from the beginning, not as a replacement for human support, but as a way to make a highly personal and often stressful experience easier to navigate.
The company describes its approach as the “Uberization of Backup Care.”
Corporate Care Solutions’ technology connects employees, employers, caregivers and care providers throughout the Care Request and fulfillment process, creating real-time visibility and communication across the care experience. Behind that technology is a human support model, with a CARE Specialist always readily available when an employee needs assistance.
“We’re the only player in the space that has Uberized Backup Care,” O’Connor says. “We connect caregivers, care providers, employers, employees and Corporate Care Solutions on one platform.”
For HR and benefits leaders, the implications extend beyond convenience.
Technology gives employers greater visibility into utilization and spending while improving the experience employees have when they actually need the benefit. Real-time reporting provides benefits teams with insight into how the program is being used, while employees gain visibility into what is happening with their Care Request.
That distinction matters.
A benefit can look attractive during enrollment, but its real value is determined at the moment an employee needs to use it, often when that employee is already under significant stress.
Corporate Care Solutions is designed around making those moments easier.
A Different Economic Model
Technology is only part of what differentiates the Corporate Care Solutions approach.
Corporate Care Solutions pioneered the pay-as-you-go financial model for employer-sponsored Backup Care, and it has been fundamental to the company’s approach from the beginning.
Family care benefits go beyond just backup care. Employees are dealing with ongoing and increasingly complex caregiving needs. Employers have an opportunity to support those employees in a much more comprehensive way.
For benefits leaders facing pressure to provide meaningful employee support while maintaining financial discipline, the model creates a compelling proposition: employers can offer Backup Care without paying in advance for care their employees may never use.
Employers also gain visibility into utilization through real-time reporting, helping benefits teams understand how employees are engaging with the program and where benefit dollars are being spent.
The philosophy is straightforward: family care benefits should create measurable value for employees and employers.
When reliable care prevents an employee from missing work, the impact can extend to absenteeism, productivity and engagement. When employers can connect their investment directly to utilization, they have a clearer view of the value the program is creating.
More Choice for Employees
Corporate Care Solutions is also challenging another traditional assumption in employer-sponsored care: that every employee should have to access care in the same way.
Families are different. Their care needs, relationships, geography and comfort levels are different as well.
Programs such as My Choice™ Care give employees the ability to choose their own caregiver or child care provider while receiving reimbursement through their employer-sponsored benefit. Care Pass™ expands flexibility in another direction, providing reimbursement for eligible care marketplace memberships rather than limiting employees to a single platform.
The approach recognizes something increasingly important in benefit design: family care rarely fits neatly into one network or one solution.
An employee in a major metropolitan area may face very different challenges from an employee caring for an aging parent in a rural community. A single parent may need a different kind of flexibility than someone in a multigenerational household. An employee may prefer an established relationship with a caregiver, while another may need help locating care.
“Families should be able to access care in their comfort zone, not ours,” Lurtsema says. “That means giving employees meaningful choices and the flexibility to use the type of care that works for their family.”
Two Sides of the Industry, One Vision
The next stage of Corporate Care Solutions is being shaped by two industry veterans whose careers approach the family care market from very different directions.
Lurtsema brings more than three decades of experience in care delivery. Before founding Corporate Care Solutions, she owned and operated a successful Nanny and Adult/Elder Care agency, working directly with families and caregivers and seeing firsthand what happens when reliable care is unavailable.
-
We’re the only player in the space that has uberized backup care. We connect caregivers, care providers, employers, employees and corporate care solutions on one platform.
It was through that experience that she began providing employer-sponsored Backup Care and recognized both the value of the benefit and the opportunity to deliver it differently.
Taking that experience into the national marketplace, however, required more than replicating a local care model. It required a national network of qualified care providers and technology capable of connecting employers, employees, providers and caregivers at scale.
Lurtsema developed both, laying the foundation for Corporate Care Solutions and the national family care platform it continues to expand today.
O’Connor came to the industry from the other direction.
A longtime HR technology and B2B executive, his career includes a pivotal leadership role at Monster.com and later Care. com, where he led Care@Work, now CareBenefits by Care.com, through a period of significant growth.
O’Connor first became involved with Corporate Care Solutions as a Board member and strategic advisor, bringing his experience in sales, marketing, growth and go-to-market strategy. He later joined Corporate Care Solutions as President and Chief Commercial Officer.
Together, their backgrounds bring two sides of the market into the same leadership team.
Lurtsema understands care from the family and care-delivery side outward. O’Connor understands the market from the employer and HR technology side inward.
That combination of deep care delivery expertise and experience building and scaling employer-facing technology businesses is helping shape the company’s next phase.
Employees need care that is reliable, flexible and human. Employers need solutions that are scalable, measurable and financially responsible. Care providers and caregivers need efficient communication and coordination.
Corporate Care Solutions is designing for all of them.
Tackling the Invisible Work Employees Bring to Work
The company’s expansion into MyLife™ Concierge illustrates how broadly Corporate Care Solutions is thinking about the relationship between life outside work and performance inside it.
Employees do not leave their personal responsibilities behind when they arrive at the office or log in from home.
They may simultaneously be arranging child care, researching resources for an aging parent, planning travel, coordinating appointments, managing household responsibilities or handling another time-consuming personal task.
That invisible workload competes for attention.
MyLife™ Concierge extends support beyond traditional caregiving by helping employees navigate many of those everyday responsibilities, reducing some of the friction that can follow them into the workday.
Corporate Care Solutions sees this as part of a broader evolution in family benefits.
The future may be defined less by isolated point solutions and more by an ecosystem that gives employees different forms of support as their lives and responsibilities change.
The Business Case for Care
That evolution comes at an important time for HR leaders. Employers continue to compete for talent while simultaneously managing benefit costs and looking for ways to improve productivity, engagement and retention.
Caregiving sits at the intersection of those challenges.
Employees do not stop being caregivers when they arrive at work. When care arrangements fail, those responsibilities can immediately affect attendance and productivity.
That changes the business conversation around family care.
The question becomes less about whether an organization should add another employee perk and more about whether it can remove a significant barrier preventing employees from being present and productive.
In that context, Backup Care becomes part of something larger: workforce infrastructure.
And the broader family care strategy becomes an opportunity for employers to support employees in a way that acknowledges the realities of modern work and modern families.
Building the Family Care Company of the Future
Corporate Care Solutions is positioning itself for its next stage of growth.
The company continues to invest in its technology, expand its national care provider network and develop solutions that give employers greater flexibility in how they support employees throughout different stages of life.
Its ambition is not to leave Backup Care behind. It is to build upon the expertise, infrastructure and experience developed through Backup Care to help redefine what employer-sponsored family care benefits can become.
The future of employee care may be less about a single benefit accessed only during an emergency and more about an interconnected ecosystem employees can turn to as different needs arise.
That means combining technology with human support, national reach with individual choice, and expanded benefits with greater financial accountability for employers.
For HR leaders, the shift reflects a larger change in workforce strategy.
Organizations have spent decades building technology, programs and benefits around what employees need at work. Increasingly, employers are recognizing that what happens outside of work can have just as much influence on whether employees are able to succeed inside it.
Corporate Care Solutions is building around that reality.
With decades of care delivery expertise, HR technology leadership, a national care network, a connected technology platform and a pay-as-you-go business model, the company believes the next generation of family care benefits can be more flexible, more transparent and more responsive to the people they are designed to serve.
And that is the future Lurtsema and O’Connor are building together.
