March 6, 2023
We speak to hundreds of job seekers a month to understand their reasons for leaving a role and criteria for their next. We also speak to many hiring managers on their attitudes to flexible working given it’s criticality in attracting new talent. Keep reading to learn where it’s most often going wrong.
As we learn to live with Covid, and the media has finally moved on from its fixation on the pandemic, there is one legacy of the Covid period that lives on: the acceleration of more flexible working conditions for workers.
While progressive companies embraced it years ago, Covid was the burning platform we needed to make flexibility mainstream, and fortunately most companies have now baked it permanently into their HR policies.
Work-from-home (WFH) is now consistently the highest search term on Seek. More broadly, it’s become a proxy for a culture and leadership style that is human centred, empowering and outcome focused. After all, to make it work leaders must fully let go of the old command and control style.
Let’s also remember that WFH has environmental and congestion benefits by keeping cars off the road, as well as the productivity and wellbeing benefits that comes from reduced commute times and the ability for staff to manage their time for maximum effect.
We’re seeing three main elements to flexibility policies emerge:
It would seem a lot of senior leaders are still grappling with how to make flexible working sustainable long term in their context. As a result the cement is still wet on what it is and how it’s applied across many businesses.
Here’s what we’ve learnt about where it’s most often going wrong:
Confusing traditional vs contemporary flexibility
When I asked a manager a few weeks ago what flexibility they offered, he spoke of the ability to work from home on occasion should a need arise. That’s an old world view of flexibility, the world has moved on.
Full remote working
I’ve yet to see this work and many of the businesses that were quick to announce a permanent move to full remote working have since reneged. There’s no substitute for face to face connections when it comes to building relationships at work.
Reverting to less flexibility (or even 5 days in the office), without justification
If the policy created to respond to Covid now isn’t working be careful to hastily undo it without first considering the actual cause. Don’t blame the policy if it’s actually a leadership issue. If you do make changes be open about why, so people are more likely to buy into the decision. It’s very common for job seekers to tell us their flexibility has been revoked companywide, but aren’t clear on the reasons.
Inconsistencies in expectations and interpretation across a business
Inconsistency across teams is not uncommon and is a sure fire trust and engagement killer. It gets harder to avoid when a new precedent is set to attract a new staff member.
It’s also problematic when a business promotes a flexibility policy which isn’t taken up by senior leaders. It takes a while to erode the sense of guilt staff feel when first taking advantage of flexible working. This is much harder to overcome if it’s obvious senior leaders don’t believe in the policy themselves. This can lead to the ‘proximity effect’: “While I’m allowed to work from home it might work against me long term if I have a leader who tends to engage more with office based staff”.
Some managers also tell us of the need to clarify what working from home actually means. Staff calling (or texting) to say they’re working from home as they have school sports and a WOF due should be met with the reply “are you sure WFH is the best option with all those distractions?” “It sounds like you’d be best to take a half/full day leave and deal with your life tasks properly”. However, this isn’t a conversation all managers are confident to have.
Leaders not adjusting their weekly operating rhythm
Managers need to be better at scheduling their time to observe and coach while staff are in the office. Historically with five days to do this you could get away with being more organic and spontaneous. The same goes with team meetings, collaboration and social time. How and when leaders and their teams connect needs to be punchier and more planned.
Stand down periods for new starters
“Oh sure we offer flexibility, but only after 6 months”. I’ve heard this a lot, and the approach might be warranted but it does come with two risks:
a) Asking a new employee to wait can create unnecessary stress by requiring them to find short term and unsustainable work arounds for traffic, dependents etc.
b) It could cancel out the benefit as an attraction for new talent.
I understand that it’s a lot easier to train someone face to face, but I think the transition to flexible working should be individual, based on the learning style of that person, their prior experience and speed of mastery. It’s easy to overestimate the time it takes to get someone up to speed. Even giving someone 1 day a week early on allows them the chance to put their training into practice, build their independent thinking and give the manager a break from training. If a stand down period is necessary, I suggest a plan based on mastery of task rather than time, it has the added benefit of forcing feedback on progression which doesn’t always happen enough.
