L&D 2020: Shaping change in learning
Work & Business
Flexible Working
In 2020 men have overtaken women in terms of numbers working flexibly for the first time. Early in the 21st Century when the right to request flexible working was first introduced in the UK (initially just for workers with children under the age of six), the spotlight was on working women coming forward to request part-time or term time only working1. The right to request was constantly extended piecemeal until now it covers most workers. One third of men now work flexi-time or compressed working hours.
Flexi-time is now especially common amongst white collar and professional men. The recent growth has been amongst those working in large workplaces and in the banking, insurance and finance industries. Of all the flexible working methods, it was flexi-time which got the biggest boost from the 2012 London Olympics especially among London and home counties based employers. Often introduced as a temporary measure to limit any potential productivity drop from employee absence to watch events or soaking up the atmosphere, companies enjoyed such employee engagement, commitment and team working gains with no overall loss in productivity that they made their flexi-time schemes permanent.
Compressed working hours meanwhile has sparked a revolution in large manufacturing and construction companies with one in five men now working full-time hours over four days rather than five.
Government legislation has allowed workers in their late 30s to arrange flexibility – of career development as well as working hours – when they have children. They generally opt to work from home to provide this flexibility during times that fit best around family care. Young people are also more demanding – and even new graduates want flexible working at the beginning of their career.
Valuable Baby Boomers, working well into their 70s, are demanding – and getting – the ability to flex paid work around their various other responsibilities and home lives.
Environmental concerns over employees commuting to work and the opening up of global markets have taken over from the cost of office space as the prime drivers fuelling a continuing steady rise in homeworking2. Some organisational cultures have struggled to cope since the early 1990s with the need to manage homeworkers on output-based objectives. Although this is still a problem for managers in some companies, on-line reporting systems are helping curb the view of homeworkers as shirkers. Company social networking sites are also making it easier for homeworkers to ‘feel’ part of a team and to identify more with the wider organisation.
1. Hooker H, Neathey F, Casebourne J, Munro M (2006) The Third Annual Work-Life Balance Employee Survey Main Findings, DTI Employment Relations Research Series No 58: UK
2. Future Work Forum, Managing Tomorrow’s Workers, Henley Management College, 2007.
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