When Life Happens: Making Sense of Family Leave in the Irish Workplace

Winter is coming and so are the coughs, colds and caring emergencies. As HR professionals know all too well, this is the season when requests for time off multiply: “My child’s sick again”, “Mum’s had a fall”, “I need time for a doctor’s appointment”. But which type of leave actually applies? Force majeure? Compassionate? Parental? Carer’s? It can feel like an alphabet soup of entitlements and one wrong move can leave an employer exposed. Join Aoife Gallagher-Watson , Director, Employment Law, EY Law Ireland, Caroline Kelly , Personal and Executive Coach, TalentPro, and Laura McKee , Knowledge Partner, Legal Island for a lively, plain-speaking session that cuts through the confusion. Together they’ll help you: 1. Decode the differences between force majeure, compassionate and carer’s leave 2. Clarify employee rights on parental, parent’s, maternity, paternity and antenatal leave 3. Handle those tricky “life happens” conversations with confidence and fairness Expect practical examples, expert insights, and a few light-bulb moments along the way. It’s 45 minutes that could save you hours of head-scratching this winter.

You can listen to When Life Happens: Making Sense of Family Leave in the Irish Workplace online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

When Life Happens: Making Sense of Family Leave in the Irish Workplace is an episode from Irish HR and Employment Law Developments by Legal Island.

This episode is 47:18 long.

This episode was published on Nov 10, 2025.

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