Music business

When country singer-songwriter Brett Young celebrated his first Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) Diamond-certified single for his 2017 hit “In Case You Didn’t Know,” the Nashville party looked a bit different than the typical Music Row shindig. The father of two welcomed not only his wife and daughters, but music executives were encouraged to bring their children as well — with more than 30 kids taking part in the event.

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The celebration was also a launch party of sorts for Family Alliance in Music (FAM), a Nashville-based non-profit, which advocates for and supports professionals across all facets of the music industry, including executives and creatives, who are achieving their career aspirations while caring for members of their family units.

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FAM was co-founded by a collective of Nashville music executives — Jackie Jones (senior vp of artist and industry relations for the RIAA), Haley Montgomery (senior manager of awards & membership for the Academy of Country Music) and Margaret Hart (YouTube’s head of Nashville industry and label relations).

The organization offers a place of community, education, and support for all families, aiding music industry members who are also parents, caretakers for aging or sick family members, and those who want to start families. FAM’s multi-pronged approach encourages employers to provide clearly defined, comprehensive family benefits and flexible work practices, as well as offering information to employers detailing why such benefits are vital.

“We all have a family,” Montgomery tells Billboard.

The idea for FAM sparked in 2021, after Montgomery invited Jones to a breakfast meeting in Nashville.

“She thought I wanted to do the typical networking meeting, but I said, ‘I would love to talk about your kid,” Montgomery recalls. “You actually post about her [on social media] and you are successful. How does that work?’” At the time, Montgomery had been surveying the music industry around her as she was hoping to start a family.

“I had been looking at this industry that I had put so much of my heart into and I couldn’t help but feel like it wasn’t going to support my full self, which included starting a family,” Montgomery says. “I showed her a survey I’d done across the industry — 25% of companies in the music industry don’t even support the minimal amount of time it takes to heal your body after giving birth. So, to me, that said, ‘This isn’t welcome here.’”

Meanwhile, Jones, who has an eight-year-old daughter, had been having conversations with Hart because they had heard from others in the music industry questioning how to balance family and career.

“Seeing how this is an industry that goes way beyond just the ‘9-to-5,’ and asks so much of those working in it — if the industry wants to truly be inclusive, it has to consider these issues,” Jones says.

“Part of what we’re doing is ripping the blindfold off,” adds Hart, a mother of two. “This is who we are; this is our whole selves.”

According to a survey of employers conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics in March 2022, 24% of private-industry employees had access to paid family leave (parental leave and family caregiving leave) through their employers.

There is currently no federal law requiring paid family and medical leave for the private sector, though 13 states and the District of Columbia have laws creating paid family and medical leave programs for eligible workers. In Tennessee, the Tennessee Paid Family Leave Insurance Act went into effect on Jan. 1, 2024, allowing insurance companies to offer paid family leave, which employers can voluntarily choose to purchase for their employees. The insurance would cover the birth or adoption of a child by the employee, placement of a child with the employee for foster care, care of a family member with a serious health condition, or in aiding families of service members of active duty or an impending call/order to active duty.

In surveying 20 music companies, FAM found that more than half offered at least 12 weeks of fully paid leave for birthing caretakers, while 25% supported only four weeks or less of fully paid leave for a birthing caretaker. Some of the top company policies did include aid for IVF, adoption and fertility testing.

FAM advocates for companies in the music industry to offer more comprehensive family benefits including, at a minimum, 12 weeks of fully paid leave for birthing caretakers, six weeks of fully paid leave for family caretakers (those caring for sick or aging family members) and for non-birthing caretakers, as well as offering travel to the nearest compliant state/care in aiding with termination assistance.

In 2023, the organization formed a task force encompassing top executives across the spectrum of the industry, including Shannon Casey (Wasserman Music), Halie Hampton-Mosley (Why & How Management), Morgan Mills (CmdShft), Tiffany Provenzano (mtheory), Rachael Terrell (Paramount), Rachel Wein (Prescription Songs), Dan Wise (maddjett) and Mackenzie Cooper (Triple Tigers).

The task force’s work is centered around four core pillars: education and resources, community, benefits and grants. In helping to increase visibility for parents and caretakers within the music industry, they just held a music industry family meet-up event in Nashville a few weeks ago. The task force is also working on holding a fertility-focused workshop and expanding the organization’s current benefits resource to include recommendations for employers regarding fertility benefits and caretaker leave. FAM is under fiscal sponsorship with the Players Philanthropy Fund (PPF), allowing the organization to receive charitable donations, while working to eventually have its own 501c-3.

“I’ve been so fortunate to work for companies that provided incredible benefits and understanding,” Jones says. “I’ve taken care of a child, I’ve had maternity leave. I’ve now lost a parent — those aren’t things you get over in a week—these are things you have to take time and have grace for.”

“It’s important to have diversity in our workforce,” Montgomery says. “Having people with different lifestyles and backgrounds at the table is going to allow you to reach more people. And it’s good business; it’s such a recruitment and retention tool.”

Hart says that their discussions with various music industry companies has been met with openness and she advises senior executives to advocate for others in their company through encouraging these policies. 

“When you can be a senior executive and come into these conversations, make sure that as you protect yourself, that you’re protecting the people coming behind you, that maybe don’t have the influence that you have in the room. It’s not just about getting you the leave that you need — it’s about getting the new employee the leave that they will need if they decide to have a family or need to be a caretaker. We’ve had conversations where someone will say, ‘Oh, my boss told me I can kind of take what I need.’ That’s a lovely sentiment, but ultimately what happens when a coordinator or assistant might need to go on leave, they aren’t protected by the handshake agreement that you’ve just made.”

Jones notes that some of the industry members who have navigated the biggest issues with family and caretaking benefits are the creatives, musicians, and artists, and says they hope to provide grants to aid this segment of the industry: “These are the very people who drive the industry at large. How are we going to help the musicians, the touring teams? Those issues are harder than, ‘Hey, can you change your policies? There is no safety net for a 1099 touring employee.”

Jones adds that making meaningful change in this segment of the industry doesn’t always necessitate a complete policy overhaul.

“I don’t want people to think, ‘They want me to provide maternity leave to my entire road crew, my band.’ It’s about what other things can you do to help make things easier—can you help with shipping breast milk from the road? Or, if someone needs to spend several weeks caring for a sick or elderly family member, can you promise them that their job will still be there? It’s not about the cost; it’s about the culture.

“In the case of women touring, whether in a band or on the road, they are usually in the minority,” Jones continues. “If you are the only woman in the band, how do you speak up? Or you look around and there are those fears of, ‘If I voice this concern, what if I don’t get to be on this tour anymore?’ Or it could be a woman that is a tour manager, or a dad that wants to take time with his newborn, or someone who needs to care for a parent.’”

“We have to be proactive to create a safe space for people to have benefits and resources that are going to be able to keep them in this industry,” Hart says. “It’s a very complicated issue and I don’t want to say, ‘We’re going to fix it,’ but I think we can help make it better.”