Is flexible working a positive for employers and employees?
While a number of employers have found success, flexible working has its challenges as well as its benefits.
Flexible working has been a hot issue recently. The COVID-19 pandemic has created a situation in which many businesses have been forced to ask employees to work remotely or flexibly. And part of what is interesting about this is that prior to the pandemic, flexible working was an extremely popular idea.
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A large number of companies have actually found that having employees work flexibly has been an advantage to them. So, it might seem that this has worked out well for everyone. However, flexible working has its challenges as well as its benefits. So here, we take a look at whether flexible working is actually a positive for employees or employers.
What employees want versus what they need
There is plenty of evidence to suggest that flexible working is something that a large number of workers covet. A recent report revealed that around half of all employees want the opportunity to work flexibly. But just because this is something that people believe they want, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it translates into a positive in reality.
It has been suggested that people who work flexibly often find that their work-life balance is adversely affected. Flexible working can blur the lines between when someone is at work and when someone is not. This could suggest that while employees are theoretically positive about the idea of flexible working – in reality, it does not achieve what they are looking for.
Is flexible working good for productivity?
One of the major reasons that employers might be interested in offering employees the chance to work flexibly is in the potential benefits for productivity. A recent study in a Chinese firm found that employees were 13% more productive when they worked flexibly from home. So, in this sense, it could be definitely seen as a good move.
But it is important to remember that changing to flexible working can create challenges for employers. This includes issues such as setting up workers so that can safely work from home and overcoming potential cybersecurity issues. In this sense it can be seen as a trade-off – businesses will need to do more to allow works to operate flexibly, but they could see advantages as a result.
Affecting how employees view each other
There is another issue that is worth thinking about beyond the opinions of the employee themselves or the employer – it is how other employees consider those who work flexibly. Sometimes flexible working is not discussed to a strong extent in the business, and this can leave a vacuum of information on why some people are allowed to work from home and others are not.
“This is an issue of trust,” says Tim Garcia, Partner at Hassans. “If a person isn’t always in the office, they can be perceived to have a lack of commitment to the company, not just by managers but by other members of staff. Additionally, someone who has little interaction with other members of staff can seem aloof.”
It can be positive for everyone
Perhaps it is worth noting here that flexible working can be positive for both employees and employers–but this means careful planning and putting some thought into how it is all going to work in practice. For example, employees need to have a say in how their flexible working arrangements are put in place–and additionally, it is important for these arrangements to be adaptable for individuals. Not everyone is looking for the same thing from their flexible working.
It is also true that employers need to adapt their entire working practice so that it can take into account the differences with staff working from home. Flexible working comes with challenges such as less control over workers and weaker levels of communication. It is important that plans should be in place to deal with this.
Final thoughts
With the right preparation and planning, flexible working can be a good thing for both employees and employers. However, as the COVID-19 pandemic forced a fast and perhaps imperfect form of flexible working upon many organizations, it may be necessary to re-think how flexible working plans run. It is only by doing this that organizations can then set up the kind of flexible working arrangements that can be positive for everyone.
Dakota Murphey has a wealth of experience in business management, with over 10 years of experience she’s worked on a number of successful campaigns. She now enjoys sharing her knowledge through her writing and connecting with like-minded professionals.
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