Flexible working myths

Here are some of the common fears managers express about flexible working - and how to respond to them:

They’ll always be running off to do caring – work won’t be a priority

This is a common misconception. There is no evidence to suggest that working parents or carers are any less committed to their jobs. On the contrary, research suggests that they are some of the hardest working, most loyal and high performing employees, eager to repay employers for allowing them to work in a way which lets them balance work and home. Most employees have some people who will need them to help when they are unwell, for example – not just working mothers. It’s worth remembering that everyone has a legal right to time off in emergencies to deal with a crisis.

Working mothers might go off again to have more children

Many employers are quite rightly concerned about disruption to their workplace. Small employers often feel that maternity leave hits them particularly hard, leaving a significant hole in a small team, and are anxious to minimise any impact. Remember, though, that this is a very brief period in the span of a woman’s whole career. If you make the investment now and help your employees who are mothers you stand to gain perhaps another 20 years + from a loyal and committed employee. Also bear in mind that you might get requests from other staff members who want similar periods off work to do other things. Employers are increasingly willing to accommodate requests from staff who want to do things like take a year off to go travelling etc.

There’ll be resentment

Many managers worry that other employees will resent women for going off on maternity leave and then returning on  a flexible working basis. The fear is that other staff might see themselves as having to cover for their colleague, who is allowed to work differently simply because she has made a personal decision to have children. However, this fear is simply unfounded. There has been no consistent evidence of a backlash against working mothers, and many companies have undermined this fear completely by allowing all workers to access flexible working arrangements, regardless of their personal circumstances. Fears that this will open the floodgates of flexible working requests have not been borne out in reality: most people want (and need) to work full-time. 

Work won’t get done

This is a common fear that managers have – how will you make it work when an employee wants to work fewer hours than before? There are different ways to approach this situation: you could insist on the job being done exactly as it was before. The main option here would be to find a job share, or someone who can dovetail to fill in the now uncovered hours. However, finding the right person can be time consuming and expensive, especially if you have to recruit in from outside. Alternatively you could look at work re-organisation. Increasingly this is what managers are doing. It involves looking at the discrete tasks which belong to a job, and then reorganising them across a team to create a new role which matches the available employee hours. 

Clients expect 24/7 contact

It will depend on the individual client (and not all are accommodating) but with most, expectations can be managed if you talk about how work will be covered right from the start. This includes a clear communications strategy, clarity about when people are, or are not available and who they can contact for back-up in an emergency.  

How will I manage it?

Lots of managers are understandably concerned about managing flexible workers, especially women  when they return from maternity leave, especially if they are coming back to a new working pattern or way of working. However, there are a number of things which can really help:

• Have a clear vision: make sure everyone buys in to your aims as a team and that they understand the benefits of achieving them.
• Set objectives that have clear outcomes – remember to celebrate milestones and measure success by outcomes, not presenteeism.
• Put your trust in people and expect the best from them. They will be more committed so you are freed up to get on with the big picture stuff.
• Treat people as you would want to be treated – get to know them as individuals, find out what makes them tick and be open to any good ideas they may have.
• Deal with individual concerns and disciplinary issues promptly – everyone will respect you for this.
• Hold regular reviews to check progress against your goals and make any necessary adjustments to keep things running smoothly.
• It is OK to say ‘no’ to flexible working sometimes, for example, if there are issues around performance or there is a genuinely negative impact on operational needs or costs.
• Make sure your communications are effective if you are working with flexible workers: hold regular team meetings to map progress and tackle any issues before they turn into problems.
• Keep people fresh and motivated by curbing excessive work hours and promoting training and development opportunities.

Foster a flexible ‘can-do’ culture – one in which there is give-and-take on both sides, shared responsibility for getting the job done and shared credit for successful outcomes.

It will cost us money. And it’s a recession

It’s not true that flexible workers cost any more money. If, for example, you welcome back a woman from maternity leave on a job share basis, then you will actually be better off, getting two workers for the price of one as well as having cover during sickness and other absences for at least part of the week. And all the evidence points to working parents and carers being among the most productive employees you can get. They are good value employees in every sense.