The UK (Labour) Government has been gently pushing the right to work flexibly for all UK workers. Last year it introduced the
right to request to work flexibly if you had a child up to the age of six. The plan was to extend this to families with children up to the age of 16 next year but it seems that pressure from small businesses coupled with expectations of a recession next year has put flexibility on hold.
It's quite depressing to see that small businesses are the ones resisting workplace change. Many small businesses, maybe even a majority, are probably knowledge businesses and the ability to work flexibily can be of enormous benefit to both employer and employee - one of those rare win-win situations.
TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: "Postponing a simple right
to request flexible working would not save a single job in the small
business sector. If such a request harms the business, the owner can
say no. This would be an astonishingly irrelevant response to
the severe economic downturn that we face and, in addition, would run
the risk of sending a message to working parents that the government is
not on their side." I have to agree with Brendan. I know that the Government agrees too because in May this year I attended the Worwise Summit (
www.workwiseuk.org) which promotes new work patterns and specifically remote working and staggered commuting. You can't work remotely if you don't work flexibly!
Of course when you read between the lines it appears that flexible
working is targetted primarily at women, and appears to be a cover for
flexible childcare arrangements rather than a genuine attempt to
improve workplace productivity (maybe more on that another time).
I'm a firm believer that flexible working in all it guises (see below) is a critical strategy in today's knowledge economy. Any individual, company, quango or government that doesn't get this is way behind the times.
There are lost of different interpretations of flexible working - this is the definition from the UK government:
'Flexible working' is a phrase that describes any working pattern adapted to suit your needs. Common types of flexible working are:
- part-time: working less than the normal hours, perhaps by working fewer days per week
- flexi-time: choosing when to work (there's usually a core period during which you have to work
- annualised hours: your hours are worked out over a year (often set shifts with you deciding when to work the other hours)
- compressed hours: working your agreed hours over fewer days
- staggered hours: different starting, break and finishing times for employees in the same workplace
- job sharing: sharing a job designed for one person with someone else
- home working: working from home