Changes in work: flexible working as a default Day One right

By Amy Butterworth, Consultancy Director

Times are changing. Labour’s commitment to deliver quickly on its new deal for working people includes a range of measures designed to make work fairer and more inclusive. At Timewise, of course one of the proposals we have welcomed being included is a commitment to make flexible working a default right. However, it does raise important questions for many employers, going a step further than the ‘right to request from day one’ legislation passed earlier this year. The manifesto commitment is:

“We’ll help ensure workers can benefit from flexible working, including opportunities for flexi-time contracts and hours that better accommodate school terms where they are not currently available, by making flexible working the default from day one for all workers, except where it is not reasonably feasible.”

The King’s Speech signalled an intent to deliver this new deal in the first 100 days, so it’s not clear at time of writing what level of consultation will be undertaken and when. The last clause around ‘where it is not reasonably feasible’ was presumably an addition to appease business lobbyists concerned about what this could mean in practice, particularly in service organisations. And yet so much can hang on this clause.

How can we make flex a default right?

In our recent Flex for All webinar, we asked the participants for their views on this new legislation. 82 per cent of attendees thought the government should act fast to deliver on its manifesto commitment. Yet 55 per cent recognised that flexibility by default may be difficult to realise in some roles – such as fire fighter, police officer or teacher.

The right to HAVE flexible work is a step on from the right to request from day one introduced this year. It implies that employers will need to find a way to accommodate more requests and be at risk of tribunals if they refuse. A new enforcement agency is expected to act against organisations who ignore the changes.

This piece of legislation will need careful positioning to ensure that it’s clear what employees have a right to, particularly when flexible working can cover a range of different working adjustments – including where you work, when you work and how much you work. No doubt some will point out the futility of a nurse wanting to work from home or a theatre whose staff want to leave at 5. And there will be important concerns about needing to hire extra staff to cover gaps in rosters or managers having to pick up the slack.

So, however this is introduced, it needs to support employers in delivering their business, as well as supporting individuals. It’s a careful line to tread, but if delivered correctly, it could enable thousands more people to access and stay in work.

Is it possible?

At Timewise, we’ve supported hundreds of organisations to transform their approach and attitudes towards flexible working. And as we’ve proved in our innovation work, there are ways to improve the options and choice someone has, even in shift-based and site-based roles.

Our work focuses on finding the ‘win-win’ where the needs of the organisation and the needs of individuals can be achieved. It involves being willing to look afresh at working practices and being willing to try something new. Being familiar with a whole range of ways to make jobs more flexible. And co-designing solutions with managers and teams.

5 ways employer brands can get ahead of the legislation

1. Get your leaders on side. Highlight the business benefits of supporting flexible working – in terms of retention, wellbeing, productivity and inclusion. There are tangible benefits if you do this properly and systemically, rather than focused on individual requests.

2. Identify your flex framework, for every role. The options may well look different for different types of role and that’s fine, when it’s linked to what that team or service deliver. But it should be possible to find some flex options which can be supported and which you can offer. Highlighting these in your advert helps.

3. Identify any systems and policies which work against being a flexible organisation. For example, counting heads instead of FTE, not having the tech to enable remote working or systems which default to everyone working 9 to 5. Addressing these will make things easier for managers to enable flexibility.

4. Support managers to start from a ‘Yes, how?’ response, rather than fear flex working requests.  Managers often feel exposed and left to pick up all the gaps when other people work flexibly so supporting them to take a whole team approach can be helpful and relieve the pressure.

5. Make it a regular conversation. Ask team members regularly about their working patterns. Get teams talking about how they’re working together. Create safe spaces for managers to discuss the challenges. Like any culture change, there will be pockets of resistance and there will be times you didn’t get it right. So make sure to keep checking in and tweak if necessary.

We look forward to seeing how this particular proposal is brought to reality. Provided it supports the needs of businesses, it could be a really important step forward in ensuring that many more people get access to the flexibility they need.

Published September 2024

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