In this episode of Meaningful Work Matters, Dr. T.L. Boyd joins Andrew Soren to explore how caregiving, particularly in its non-traditional forms, influences leadership, resilience, and inclusion in the workplace.
Dr. Boyd is an Assistant Professor of Management and Leadership at Texas Christian University. His work focuses on historically marginalized populations and the often-unseen dimensions of meaningful work, such as caregiving responsibilities that fall outside traditional definitions.
Together, they examine how recognizing caregiving as real work can change how we support employees, build more inclusive environments, and challenge outdated assumptions about who is “fit” for leadership.
Making the Invisible Visible
Boyd opens the conversation by explaining his research focus: bringing visibility to stories that are often left out of organizational life.
As a Black man and an academic, he emphasizes how “me-search” can be just as powerful as research. His personal and professional identities are tightly linked, which helps shape the stories and questions he brings into his academic work.
At the heart of this episode is a call to expand how we define work.
Traditional workplace culture often draws a firm line between what counts as work and what belongs to life outside of it. Caregiving, especially the kind that doesn’t fit into conventional molds, tends to get ignored entirely.
Boyd challenges that divide. As he puts it:
“Meaningful work isn’t just what we’re paid to do. It’s what we do with intention and purpose.”
What Counts as Caregiving?
When people hear the word “caregiver,” many picture a parent caring for a child. But Boyd’s research invites a much broader definition. Non-traditional caregivers include those caring for aging parents, disabled siblings, partners, or anyone outside the classic nuclear family model.
In fact, many caregivers may not even identify themselves with that label. They might not wear a badge or disclose their responsibilities at work, but their roles still influence how they show up.
Boyd shares examples from his own community: a friend who is the primary caregiver for both her younger brother with Down syndrome and her mother with physical disabilities, and another who advocates for her son on the autism spectrum. These roles require resilience, empathy, and complex coordination skills that often rival those of high-level executives.
As Boyd puts it, “You need a CEO? Get a mom.”
Caregiving as a Strength, Not a Deficit
Boyd champions a shift from deficit thinking to a strengths-based approach. Traditionally, caregiving is seen as a distraction or a limitation when it comes to professional advancement. Boyd flips that narrative.
Non-traditional caregivers often build skills that are deeply valuable in the workplace. These include:
Resilience: The ability to face setbacks and find creative ways forward
Empathy: A deep understanding of others’ needs and emotions
Time management: The capacity to prioritize, juggle, and plan effectively
Adaptability: Navigating unexpected changes with flexibility
These are not soft skills. They are leadership skills. Yet many organizations fail to recognize them because they are developed outside of formal roles.
Boyd argues that this hidden labor is often the most formative. “Caregivers are doing the work of inclusion and leadership every day,” he explains. “But unless organizations are willing to look beyond surface-level metrics, they miss it.”
Family-To-Work-Spillover
One concept Boyd raises in the episode is how caregiving experiences can carry over into the workplace. He describes this as “family-to-work spillover,” where the skills, empathy, and resilience developed at home begin to shape how someone leads or collaborates at work.
For example, someone who has navigated the healthcare system for a parent may become more patient and resourceful at work. A foster parent might bring a deeper sense of empathy to their team.
Boyd calls this dynamic “enrichment,” where lessons learned in one part of life make another part stronger. He encourages both individuals and organizations to stop treating caregiving as something separate from work and to start treating it as an asset.
What Organizations and Managers Can Do
The episode turns toward practical implications with a challenge for leaders: Are your policies and workplace cultures designed for everyone, or only for people in traditional family structures?
Boyd and Soren explore how often support systems like parental leave or caregiver benefits are narrowly defined. Many non-traditional caregivers either don’t qualify or aren’t aware of what’s available to them.
The solution starts with awareness.
Boyd emphasizes that managers have a responsibility to understand the caregiving realities of their teams, not just in one-on-one check-ins but in how they shape team culture. He describes managers as “climate engineers” who set the tone for openness and inclusion.
If leaders want employees to be honest about their needs, they have to build environments where people feel safe to share. That means being trained, being proactive, and being willing to learn from those with lived experience.
Creating Space for Growth Without Pressure
Soren raises an important tension in the conversation: how to explore the growth potential in caregiving without gaslighting people who are struggling.
Boyd emphasizes that the first step is not asking caregivers to do more emotional labor. Instead, organizations should begin by evaluating their own systems. Before assuming that someone is underutilizing available resources, leaders should ask a different question: Do people even know this support exists?
As Boyd puts it, the burden shouldn’t fall on potentially overwhelmed caregivers to navigate confusing systems or justify their needs. Support begins with awareness, and that awareness must come from leadership.
He encourages HR professionals, team leads, and inclusion advocates to take the following steps:
Audit policies: Are current benefits accessible to non-traditional caregivers?
Train leaders: Equip managers with language and tools to support disclosure and dialogue.
Create space: Normalize conversations around caregiving, just like we do for other forms of diversity.
Recognize skills: Acknowledge caregiving as valid experience that builds leadership capacity.
Why This Matters for Meaningful Work
The concept of meaningful work often centers on personal fulfillment, but that fulfillment is shaped by the broader systems we work within. If those systems ignore caregiving, they are missing a key part of what makes people whole.
Meaningful work cannot be separated from a meaningful life. And caregiving is one of the most meaningful, yet overlooked, forms of work there is.
Organizations that want to retain talent, build inclusive cultures, and prepare the next generation of leaders need to start asking better questions. Not just about performance, but about what people carry with them when they come to work each day.
Resources for Further Exploration
Read T.L. Boyd’s co-authored research paper: Out of the Shadows: Bringing Nontraditional Caregiving to the Foreground of Management Research
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