SHRM Foundation Awarded Landmark Grant to Reframe Care at Work

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The SHRM Foundation has been awarded the largest grant in its history: a multi-year award from the Workplace Innovation Now (WIN) Challenge, led by Aspen Digital, to launch Reframing Care at Work, an initiative to develop and validate new narratives that position cultures of care as a core strategy for workforce performance, competitiveness, and shared prosperity. The SHRM Foundation is one of just 18 grantees selected from a pool of nearly 900 applicants nationwide. The WIN Challenge is a $60 million grant competition supported by Pivotal, a group of organizations founded by Melinda French Gates.

Caregiving is a defining workforce issue: an estimated 105 million Americans — roughly three in four workers — are working caregivers, yet workplace practices and narratives have not kept pace. Caregiving is still often framed as a private responsibility and employer support as a cost, accommodation, or productivity tradeoff, contributing to workforce exits, stalled advancement, absenteeism, and economic insecurity, particularly for women, while creating retention and resilience challenges for employers.

Reframing Care at Work, housed within the SHRM Foundation's Thriving Together portfolio, addresses this disconnect over the next three years by combining rigorous interview-based research into the attitudes and belief systems of employers and public sector leaders with practical employer resources, real-world implementation, national communications, and policy engagement.

Reframing Care at Work is led by the SHRM Foundation in partnership with Topos Partnership and the Elizabeth Dole Foundation. The WIN Challenge is ​led by Aspen ​Digital, a program​ of the Aspen Institute and ​supported by Pivotal, a group of organizations founded by Melinda French Gates.

"Caregiving is a universal workforce reality,” said Wendi Safstrom, President, SHRM Foundation. "Despite broad agreement that employees should not have to choose between work and caring for loved ones, dominant narratives persist that frame care as a cost, an accommodation, or a private responsibility. These narratives are further reinforced by assumptions: that flexibility undermines productivity, and that caregiving support benefits only a narrow group. As a result, employers and policymakers often hesitate to act, even when evidence and good intent are present."

“Caring for a loved one shouldn’t have to mean putting your career, your ambitions, or your future on hold,” said Steve Schwab, Chief Executive Officer, Elizabeth Dole Foundation. "Through the Workplace Innovation Now (WIN) Challenge, the Elizabeth Dole Foundation is joining forces with the SHRM Foundation and Topos Partnership to give employers the language, tools, and confidence to move from recognizing caregivers to supporting them. When workplaces build cultures of care, caregivers, employers, and communities all grow stronger.”

"Topos research uncovers the 'cultural common sense' that, while widely held, often operates below conscious awareness, shaping how we talk, think, feel, and act,” said Joseph Grady PhD, Co-founder Topos Partnership. "We're excited to contribute to this important initiative with new research that points toward fresh ways to frame the conversation, build shared consensus, and advance action around caregiving goals that benefit both workers and employers."

Over the next three years, Reframing Care at Work will conduct national research, build a Cultures of Care Action Hub containing curated playbooks, ROI briefs and trainings, and develop an Employer Diagnostic tool designed to move employers from awareness to action. Additionally, validated messaging will be tested through national communications, and the model will be piloted in two local communities before synthesizing findings into public-facing guidance for employers, policymakers, and advocates nationwide. All with the goal of demonstrating that supporting working caregivers is responsible, feasible, and a competitive advantage.

About the Elizabeth Dole Foundation 

Founded in 2012 by Senator Elizabeth Dole, the Elizabeth Dole Foundation is the nation's leading organization empowering, supporting, and honoring America's 14.3 million military and veteran caregivers — the spouses, parents, family members, and friends who care for the nation's wounded, ill, or injured veterans. Through its Hidden Heroes Campaign and a national coalition of public, private, nonprofit, and faith-based partners, the Foundation drives innovative programs, advocacy, and policy solutions that raise awareness of and provide direct support to military caregivers and their families. The Foundation is headquartered in Washington, D.C. For more information, visit elizabethdolefoundation.org.

About Topos Partnership 

Topos Partnership is a communications research and strategy firm specializing in framing science and narrative research. Topos helps advocates, funders, and organizations analyze, develop, and test the names, terms, and messages that shape public understanding of issues like jobs, health, opportunity, and the economy. Drawing on the cognitive and social sciences as well as public opinion research, Topos identifies the deep cultural narratives that shape how people understand public interest issues and develops communication strategies to shift them. The firm is based in Providence, Rhode Island. For more information, visit topospartnership.com.

About the SHRM Foundation

SHRM Foundation empowers Human Resources as a force for social good. As the nonprofit arm of SHRM, the world's largest HR professional society, the Foundation believes that HR holds a unique position to lead change in the face of complex challenges within the world of work. The organization mobilizes and equips HR to ensure the prosperity and thriving of talent and workplaces. The Foundation works by widening pathways to work for more skills-first candidates and more kinds of talent; tackling societal challenges, with a current focus on workplace mental health and wellness; and strengthening the HR field with even more diversity, growth, and readiness to address these needs. SHRM Foundation works with SHRM, courageous partners, and bold investors to generate awareness, action, and impact to build a world of work that works for all. For more information, visit SHRMFoundation.org.