January 17, 2019
Quarter of UK workers have turned down a job for not offering flexible working
A new study from communications technology business TeleWare claims that a growing number of employees are turning down jobs that don’t offer some form of flexible working. The survey of 2,300 UK employees claims that a quarter of all employees have turned down a job in the past for this reason. Whilst a further third (31 percent) would actively do so. Although the proportion of those that have done so is higher amongst younger workers (40 percent), three in 10 (29 percent) employees over 45 would turn down a job if flexible work options were not on offer.
Flexible working is supposed to be a boon to working parents, but it seems it’s not without its disadvantages, as a new academic study has found that part-time working mothers who have the ability to control their own schedule often end up working an increased amount of unpaid overtime. The research from the University of Kent found that for those who gained schedule control over their work there was an increase in the amount of unpaid overtime worked, as on average in the UK men work an extra 2.2 hours a week in unpaid overtime while for women it is about 1.9 hours.
December 13, 2018
Flexible working should not mean employers ask people to work all the time
by Oliver Shaw • Comment, Flexible working, Wellbeing
Talking about the role of technology within the flexible working arena is hardly ground-breaking. For decades, technological advancements have been hailed as pivotal to developments within the employment landscape. But this year, conversation appears to have reached another level. In an article for Open Access Government in June 2018, for instance, Richard Morris, UK CEO of International Workplace Group (IWG), explained the extent to which technology-driven shifts have caused significant social change. And in September, HR headlines homed in on a study by Capita and Citrix, which stressed that an inability to quickly introduce new IT services is restricting organisations’ flexibility proposition, and consequently their competitiveness.
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