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Do you have the resources in place to make flexible working a reality? According to BERR’s reports on flexible working, 91% of offices agree to all requests for home working, but in my opinion far fewer than this actually offer the resources to make it a practical reality.
For example, how many business owners promoted the annual National Work from Home Day within their company back in May, and offered employees the opportunity to take advantage of it?
Now the Government has announced its commitment to broaden the right to request flexible working to parents of children up to the age of 16, with the consultation period underway as of today, there’s even greater need for employers to address their approach to it.
Support for this current employment buzzword is immensely widespread; it’s being used to incentivise current employees as well as offer an additional sell-in factor to potential new recruits.
Interesting to see, then, the difference between the reality and what employers offer out as their company message on the subject: 43% of employees feel that their company does not offer sufficient options to make flexible working a reality in their profession, according to our own research.
This seems a great pity. Obviously you can’t just say “ok team – go flex-work”, and implementing new technologies more often than not has to take second place to actually getting the job done.
But the process of implementing flexible working practices, and the communications infrastructure that can make it all happen, is far easier than most businesses may believe.
For a start, flexible working is no longer an all or nothing practice - there are different degrees to which it can be implemented. It can involve merely time flexibility or, now more commonly, both time and location flexibility.
Beyond that, however, technologies are increasingly enabling more sophisticated and revolutionary flexible working that entails a complete ‘virtual office’ scenario.
Offering total location independence and greater autonomy for employees in the way they manage and plan their work, this ‘third generation’ delivers the real value of facilitating a flexible workforce.
Phone lines, PC connections, web access and email system can all be wrapped up into affordable, all-in-one IP-based solutions that enable anytime, anyplace, anywhere access. With all phone calls, voicemail, instant messaging, contacts lists and business applications at your disposal, home working can easily seem like office working.
The set-up greatly simplifies communication and collaboration across the business, while ensuring that, unlike cobbling it together yourself, the entire network is stable, secure and supported.
And in time these practices can pay great dividends. Employees can work as a team, even when they are apart, and respond to queries and new business opportunities faster and in a more customer-friendly and focused way, with all of the resources they require readily accessible.
It will generate greater revenue through speed of transaction and return custom and, ultimately, it’s what your customers expect.
But so often companies take the rushed route and throw together technologies here and there to mock up an idea of a unified communications platform, or even worse allow staff to implement their own methods – the potential security breaches alone aren’t worth thinking about.
A more logical approach is to opt for one IT partner that can implement a bespoke IP communications network and services alongside your existing systems cost-effectively - taking the hassle out of the complexity.
It is claimed that 5 million workers will log on from home this year – big number, but actually less than a quarter of the UK workforce. Ninety-four per cent of all employees believe it’s important to work for a company that takes a serious and responsible approach to offering employees a good work-life balance, with 52% stating it as very important.
With the quantity of skilled workers in short supply, can businesses really afford not to make flexible working a real option for employees?
The Government’s consultation process will explore ways to make dealing with flexible working requests easier for businesses to handle - for example, reducing the related paperwork - but it’s not the only way to lighten the load.
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