Nicola Mullarkey has been involved in the recruitment sector for nearly 20 years is a co-chair of Women in Recruitment (see her full biog below). Her guest blog post for us seems rather timely as we hear the phrase flexi-working more and more in the workplace – but what does it mean?
The CIPD describes ‘Flexible working’ as a type of working arrangement which gives a degree of flexibility on how long, where, when and at what times employees work.
Many Employers seem to be a little afraid to embrace flex-working for their team, especially in the recruitment sector which has a very work hard, play hard reputation.
Some of your concerns may be:
- Is our workforce going to all go part time?
- Are they all going to request to work from home and we have empty offices that we are paying for?
- Is delivery going to suffer?
- Will they still hit their targets?
These are many questions that come up for SME’s when flexitime is mentioned.
Not everyone is going to want to work from home or cut their hours, some just need that flexibility to do their working week around other commitments.
The most commonly known ways of flexi working are working:
- part time, this is working a reduced number of hours per week
- compressed hours where the working week is squashed into fewer days just longer blocks of working hours
- Flexi time – which allows the employee to choose within certain set limits when to begin and end work
- Working from home
Other ways of flex-working are:
- Commissioned outcomes
- Job sharing
- Term time working
These are some of the different ways of flexi working. What we have noticed within the recruitment sector that flex-working is not as flexible as some of us need it to be, is this the reason we are losing some top talent?
Often you will find that if a staff member asks to work part time, being in a sales position we believe that working part time and sales do not work – though you will be pleasantly surprised, especially if the person is just looking to cut off the beginning of end of their day – having a shorter day’s people become more focused and better managers of their time and often get the same amount of work done. If part time means only working 3 or 4 days a week – again, you’ll find that good consultants will always keep an eye on their email as they will want to move forward every sale!
If your staff would like to work from home for some portion of the week, talk to them, review their set-up; do they have a separate room that they can use as an office, do they have the facilities that are needed, i.e. good internet access a laptop, a phone line. If they have young children, are they at school or in childcare minimizing distractions.
Being in the recruitment sector most consultants are targeted on their sales so you will find out rather quickly if flexi-working is working for them.
It has been found that not only does flexi-working help retain top talent in the business but it also helps:
- Provide your staff with a better work life balance or as I prefer to say work life integration
- Reduces stress levels
- Increases staff retention
- Increases productivity levels
- It also helps attract top talent into your business
We have the technology at our disposal – let’s use it to help increase productivity, increase staff retention and grow our businesses.
More and more of our clients are embracing flexi working in their many different guises and this is helping retain their top quality talent, what can we do to help the recruitment industry embrace this change?
Nicola is passionate about helping small business owners create the work life balance they deserve. She has been involved in the recruitment sector since 1998, has run her own recruitment business and now works with small businesses. Nicola is a mentor for the Cherie Blair foundation and is Co-Chair of Women in Recruitment. Nicola’s is known for her honest and straight-talking way of working and has become known as the Honest Recruiter. Download her FREE eBook ‘The 3-Secrets to Work-Life Balance Revealed’ here. For more information Nicola please go to www.thehonestrecruiter.com or check out her LinkedIn profile.
