As part of our campaign to deliver #FairFlexibleFutures, we’ve been looking into how some organisations have tackled, and learned from, the challenges created by the pandemic. Here's how Leicestershire County Council approached it.
Leicestershire County Council is an organisation serving the residents of Leicestershire. The council employs over 6,500 employees and proactively offers a range of part-time and flexible arrangements. However, in certain roles that provide face to face services, flexible working may be more limited.
Tina Goswami is an Organisational Development Advisor for Leicestershire County Council. Using psychological and behavioural insights, Tina delivers various OD projects, coaching and team interventions to improve the organisational culture, productivity and wellbeing.
Life before lockdown
In 2014, Leicestershire County Council began their journey towards introducing and integrating smarter working across the organisation. This work, which Tina was involved in, meant the council offered a variety of flexible arrangements to suit employee needs before Covid-19. As a forward-thinking employer, Leicestershire County Council’s employees could work part-time, compressed and term time hours with flexibility in start and finish times as well as work from home.
The greatest barrier to more flexibility was service needs. The logistical constraints of some roles, such as road workers and librarians, meant working hours and location were not as flexible. However, there was more flexibility available for office-based staff who could work from home either occasionally or on a regular basis.
In 2019, a Workplace Project commenced to further embed smarter working practices looking at technological, workspace and people aspects, this work was being rolled out as the pandemic hit.
Reacting to the crisis
With good flexible working practices already in place, Leicestershire County Council acted quickly, shifting most staff to remote working. The organisation introduced a £200 home-working allowance for all staff to help create a comfortable working environment.
Leicestershire County Council set out clear expectations around working protocols and employees were trusted to work flexibly around their own needs. As a large organisation, the responsibility fell to departmental managers to ensure staff had access to home working advice, resources and could work effectively. Following open conversations, managers could create flexible arrangements to fit their team’s needs.
For those working in front-line jobs, the council carried out risk assessments and reviewed job design to understand which roles needed to continue working onsite. Depending on the role, a blended pattern of home and site working was adopted. For example, social care roles successfully adapted home visits to video calls with clients, reducing risk and travel time.
Supporting employees to keep working
There were three main ways in which the organisation enabled their employees to continue working during the pandemic.
More practically, they created a hub of well-being resources and support. This platform included advice on remote working, training packages for Microsoft Teams and regular updates on working practices in line with government guidance. The council also hosted a health and wellbeing week which was centred around key themes such as stress, resilience, sleep and health. Employees found the event very beneficial and have requested similar events to take place in the future.
Tina was also involved in delivering managerial workshops and 1-1 coaching sessions on managing remote teams. These interventions, along with the development of a ‘Managers Charter’ to set out leadership expectations, ensured managers were equipped with the knowledge to lead their team through the crisis.
Thirdly, the organisation further encouraged flexibility around when and how work was delivered. The priority was employee wellbeing and work was measured on output not on specific hours. Creating this culture of trust supported those with caring responsibilities to work around their own needs.
Learning from the experience
For Leicestershire County Council, one of the biggest learnings has been the importance in trusting employees to work in the best way for them. Lockdown has made some previously resistant managers understand and see the benefits of flexible working as productivity increased.
The Covid-19 pandemic made the case for smarter working clear and enabled the organisation to push forward the existing flexible working policies further. Roles which previously had to be done in the office, such as ICT and customer services, have now successfully been moved to remote working.
Moving forward, Tina hopes that the organisation will retain the increased flexibility. Adopting a blended pattern of working, the council is considering how to return to the office, using the space as a hub for creative and collaborative meetings. Tina believes that the open culture and increased trust which developed during lockdown will be key to making a success of this new blended model of working.
Cassie Kemp and Marissa Gisbourne are librarians at Leicestershire County Council’s Creative Learning Services. Cassie and Marissa are based in the Learning Hub in the Eastern Annexe and visit schools when required to host sessions; offering a subscription service to support school curriculums and promoting reading for pleasure.
Life before lockdown
Before Covid-19, Cassie and Marissa both worked a blended pattern between the Learning Hub and schools. As a team Creative Learning Services’ scope of work is three-fold: offering resource loans, learning workshops and professional support. This means a team members day to day activities can vary from selecting books for a school or delivering workshops to all age groups.
Cassie worked a full-time contract in the office or in schools, with a good work-life balance working 9-5pm hours. Homeworking was available if Cassie needed it, but it was an exception to her normal pattern.
On the other hand, Marissa worked part-time three days a week. Working Tuesday to Thursday from 8:30-4:30pm allowed Marissa to balance her work with looking after her children.
There was flexibility in hours on both sides as sometimes the role required an earlier start to align with school hours.
Working through the crisis
When lockdown was introduced, the whole team started working from home. As their work often entails working face-to-face in schools, the team discussed how they could continue to provide their services. The biggest change was shifting their school workshops online. This process allowed for team creativity as they shared thoughts on how to create engaging content.
However, some of the team still needed to be in the office to sort and select resources to send into schools. Once employees were allowed to return to council buildings a rota was created to limit the number of people on site and considered individual needs. As a low risk employee with no caring responsibilities, Cassie was one of the first people back in the library.
With fewer people working with direct access to resources, the team had to re-evaluate their working practices. Previously each member had a set of schools they were responsible for. With lockdown, this shifted to the team working collaboratively to cover the workload in regards to selecting resources to send into schools. Work that could be done remotely, such as key wording new books on the services’ library management system, was allocated to those needing to work from home. And tasks such as sorting and scanning new resources was done by those present in the library. This style of working created a collaborative team environment.
For Marissa, it quickly became apparent that juggling work and home-schooling young children was not effective. Marissa worked closely with her manager to informally agree flexible working hours to meet her needs. With the flexibility to start early or finish late, Marissa also tried to carve out set working hours in the day so the team could contact her. This flexibility in hours was vital in enabling Marissa to continue working.
Support from employers
Within the wider council, there was an abundance of resources and guidance to help employees adjust to different working patterns. In addition, transparent communication from leadership and open forums helped to address any concerns Cassie and Marissa had. Leicestershire County Council also conducted surveys to understand employee sentiment, responding quickly to any negative feedback.
Cassie and Marissa’s managers held bi-weekly virtual meetings to check in with the team. They were encouraged to try different ways of working that suited them and because of this flexibility, were the first service to fully recover in the Communities and Wellbeing department. Both Cassie and Marissa felt trusted to work around their own needs in a supportive inclusive culture.
Learning from the experience
Lockdown has taught both Cassie and Marissa about the different ways of working. It highlighted the efficiency of homeworking both on the interface with clients and having greater flexibility in their own time. It has also allowed the library to expand their client services, offering a mix of in person and online sessions.
The pandemic has allowed the team to gain a better understanding of where work can be done most effectively, saving the quieter tasks for at home. Moving forward, Cassie will look to return to full-time office working, knowing she can work remotely if needed. On the other hand, Marissa hopes to continue with some home-working to help balance work and childcare.
Despite the struggles of lockdown, flexibility enabled both Cassie and Marissa to continue working and delivering their roles, feeling lucky to work for an employer that trusts them to get the job done.
This case study is part of a series supported by The National Lottery Community Fund, as part of their Emerging Futures Fund
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