The world moves on, but in many ways, business has been slow to adapt. A couple of decades ago, it made sense for companies to operate from specific premises during set hours. Nowadays, however, this isn’t always necessary. In an increasingly connected world, we can often offer our people flexibility in when and where they do their work. Furthermore, in Great Britain, we have legal obligations to meet regarding flexible working.
The Law
All employees that have worked for an organisation for more than 26 weeks are eligible to make a statutory application for flexible working. A common misconception is that this only applies to carers and/or parents, but in fact, anybody can make the request, and business is legally obliged to consider the application and make appropriate arrangements in a timely fashion.
What is Flexible Working?
Various types of flexible working exist. Job sharing, part-time, compressed hours, flexitime, annualised hours, working from home, etc.
An employer can reject an application for flexible working if specific criteria are met (e.g. Damaging costs, workforce shortage, insufficient scope to reorganise, etc.). However, often businesses see flexible working as a nuisance not because it poses real problems, but only because it isn’t the traditional thing.
Ignoring legal requirements, I’d like you to consider some reasons to offer flexible working and why it can be hugely beneficial.
Combatting Stress
I’ve looked at stress in previous articles, and it is a significant problem. Studies have shown that flexible working can reduce work-related stress. If you have an employee struggling with stress or other mental health issues, wouldn’t it be better for both of you if they could continue to work in a more suitable environment? Unless they’re in a customer-facing role, perhaps you could allow them a day or two per week to work from home?
Other options would be allowing them to work compressed hours – this is where they work extra hours on certain days, allowing them more free time on others. During this free time, they may be able to catch up on sleep, attend therapy sessions or merely spend time unwinding to reduce their stress levels. During busy periods, this might not always be feasible, but looking at ways to offer a solution is still preferable to having an ongoing problem.
Attracting Parents/Carers
A lot of capable, qualified and talented individuals are frozen out of the job market when employers are unwilling or unable to offer working solutions that suit an individual’s situation. Again, business leaders should ask themselves does a particular job need to be done at the office during set hours, or can a compromise be reached?
If you can find a way to offer working solutions that are more appealing to carers and parents, you increase the potential pool of talent that can help your business grow. A flexible working solution means that parents aren’t eating into vacation days to attend a school play. It can allow people to spend less on childcare or alternative care for a loved one. Rather than organising everything around work, they can arrange work around their responsibilities. This will lead to a happier work/family balance.
Reducing Unnecessary Commutes
The daily commute to and from work continues to be a frustrating nightmare for many workers. Traffic jams, crowded buses and trains. Few people feel energised and motivated after having suffered through an hour or more of the morning grind to work. Is it necessary to put people through it?
Of course, it depends on the job and the role but unless there is a reason someone needs to be in the office, might it not be better if they stayed at home? They could grab an extra hour in bed, sit at their presumably comfortable desk, log on to your system and work with a much more positive mindset than they will having just sat through an hour of rush hour hell.
Even if they cannot work from home, is the 9-to-5 schedule essential? Perhaps they could come in at 10 and leave at 6, consequently avoiding a lot of rush hour traffic? You may even find that with a more positive and relaxed mindset, an individual can do as much work between 10 and 5 as they would have between 9 and 5.
Early Birds vs Night Owls
There is a common misconception that early birds are hard workers and night owls are slackers. In truth, some people just are not morning people. Studies have even suggested that night owls tend to be some of the most creative and intelligent individuals. Famous examples of night owls are Sir Winston Churchill, JRR Tolkien and Bob Dylan.
The misconception about night owls may well be due to traditional working hours. If you notice that somebody struggles during the early part of the day but is a productivity machine towards the end of it, perhaps they might be a night owl? If so, is there a way you could turn this to both your advantages by offering flexible working hours? It is a waste of talent if they do their best work after they’ve knocked off for the night.
Similarly, with early birds, are you noticing that they tend to tackle work head-on first thing but are worn out by the end of the day? Again, could you work around this? Could they come in a bit earlier so that you both capitalise on their early-morning performance boost? This may also help to reduce the frustration of the morning commute.
Giving Your People a Sense of Control
People value their freedom, and few like to feel they’re in a dictatorship. Giving your people a sense of control over their work/life balance can make them feel valued and appreciated. It may even invigorate and motivate them because they will see you as an empathic business responding to their individual needs.
Some business leaders fear that offering flexible working will lead to a productivity loss and that their people will start to underperform due to too much freedom. However, it may very well be the case that by offering flexible working you encourage people to put their very best in. Few people who work in an environment that in-turn works for them will do anything to jeopardise their future with the business. Rather than ‘taking the mickey’, they are much more likely to pour more of their effort into every project because they respect their employer and the job that they have.
Reducing Costs
Where it is possible for more people to work remotely, there is great potential to reduce business overheads. Instead of having a large office with the necessary expenses (utilities, rent, business rates, etc.) you can have a smaller office with more of your people working from home. While you may need to consider some level of costs incurred for this, it may well be that the reduction in operating expenses leads to a clear advantage for your business. With so many ways to facilitate remote work, even in team-based environments, it at least behoves a business owner or manager to think about whether off-site flexible working is something that might work for them.
Similarly, by offering flexible working hours, you may find a decrease in the costs of productivity losses when someone has needed to take time off. It is possible that you will need to hire fewer temps to cover staff shortfalls.
You may even find that sick days decrease too as someone who wakes up ill but feels better later that day may still be inclined to get some work done, instead of taking the whole day off as is currently prevalent.
Disadvantages
There are disadvantages to flexible working, particularly for those in customer-facing roles or if you run a ‘traditional’ business where company culture dictates home-workers are lazy. Being unable to offer the same level of flexibility to all of your people may create some resentment amongst colleagues. Where there are client handovers to consider, flexitime or compressed work hours may introduce complications.
It will never be a case of deciding to go with flexible working. You will need to consider whether it is the best move for your business. However, in my opinion, the potential benefits far outweigh the negatives for a significant number of organisations.
