Flexible Working – Is it for you?

There are many different forms of flexible working available and many organisations in the UK now allow their employees to work in a more flexible way to accommodate a better work-life balance. Are you one of them? The days of working 9-5, Monday to Friday have gone, with a number of businesses operating term time only hours, compressed hours (full working week condensed down into 3/4 days), flexi time, job sharing and several other options. 

There have been a number of conversations in the last couple of years regarding a shift to a 4 day working week as opposed to the standard 5 days, Monday to Friday.  Many businesses can’t afford to shut down mid-week so implement other forms of flexible working instead. It allows them to continue to work without having a set period of time with no employees and sees business benefits such as increases to employee retention and engagement.

Flexible working is now a statutory right for all employees with over 26 weeks service. This means that any one at any point can formally request to change something about their working pattern or hours. This doesn’t mean the employer has to agree to it, but there is a process behind the request that has to be carefully thought through before responding. It would be advisable to have a conversation with the individual about the request in more detail before formally accepting or rejecting the request to ensure you as the employer understand all aspects.

Not only does flexible working improve retention and engagement but it can also help with recruiting new staff. An employer who considers flexible working arrangements is one that is seen much more favourably than another who doesn’t. Having a flexible working arrangement can sometimes be valued more than the salary someone is paid and work-life balance in this day and age is key.

For further information on how this works in practice and guidance on what to do with a request, just get in touch using the “Get in touch” tab.

Return to Work Interview; Are they Important?

An employee has been off sick, do you sit down and meet with them on their return or do you just greet them and let them get back to their job? If your answer is the latter, my advice would be get a return to work process in place! They can be invaluable to your business and you will soon see improvements in attendance.

What is a return to work interview you ask?

In its simplest form, it is a meaningful conversation between an employee and their manager to discuss their period of absence and how they are feeling now they have returned to work. This enables you to understand if there are any underlying issues that you need to be aware of and to update them on anything they have missed at work, and gives the opportunity to the individual to inform you of anything they haven’t wanted to make you aware of before now. It doesn’t have to be formal in the sense of a typical “interview” setting, it can simply be a sit down conversation (away from other members of staff), with a hot drink and an open and recorded discussion.

For example, you may have someone who does a manual job but they have been suffering with a pain in their arm for a period of time, so now you are aware, you can make a risk assessment of the duties they carry out and how you can support them back at work.  

RTWI are for both short and long term absences. For those individuals who have been absent for a longer period of time (>7 days), this will help you as an employer to agree a return to work plan that suits both parties and put any adjustments in place to support them.

The Business Benefits

Depending on the issues (if you have any) of sickness in your business, a return to work interview can have different benefits.

If you have a particular problem with short term sickness, this process will have huge benefits. Often when an individual has to explain themself in person, this tends to put people off just taking a day off sick instead of coming into work,  and also tends to deter dishonesty in people. It provides employees with the message that the business isn’t going to just ignore sickness and will manage it for every individual. As every RTWI should be recorded, this also helps with any future formal meetings you may need to hold with them.

For more information and guidance on how to carry out RTWI’s and what you should use to record the detail, get in touch.