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Toolkit / Culture / Flexible workingFlexible working
Flexible working policies create an inclusive workplace, allowing everyone - not just women - to develop a working pattern that suits their lives whilst still doing an effective job. But it can carry a stigma and result in negative perceptions.
It offers an opportunity for people to build a better work/life balance, and when people are happy their productivity increases. Employers should focus on the output and outcomes.
There are creative ways to approach it: shorter days, shorter weeks, working four weeks out of five, job sharing… the idea is to be flexible. And the keys to success are having working relationships built on trust, then recognising and rewarding performance and deliverables.
Here are some other things to consider:
- Focus on work outputs and outcomes.
- Introduce it as a gender-neutral way of working for everyone.
- Embed it into the culture so it is not a barrier to promotion.
- Encourage take-up (set goals if it helps).
- Talk about it positively and have male and female role models.
- Schedule events, networking and training to suit.
- Track against goals and publicise the results.
- Mention it in job adverts.