Life Meets Work Blog

Heard in our webinar with the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce today: “Flexible work arrangements are not an entitlement.  You are in control.  Both parties need to bring something to the table.”

Fabulous message.  Flexibility is a two-way street.  Employees must demonstrate that they are able to perform well in whatever flexible arrangement they’re using.  And the best flex arrangements are those in which the employee can still be somewhat accessible during standard work hours—in case emergencies or special project needs arise.

But recognize that a failed flex arrangement doesn’t have to be a one-and-done situation either. If an employee isn’t demonstrating productivity from home one day a week, perhaps he or she would work better on a compressed work week.

That’s a challenge for both employees and managers—understanding each individual’s needs and work styles.  Many employees are stimulated by the home environment.  Others find they need either the structure or the access to peers that an office provides.

That’s why it’s also important to remember that flexibility isn’t a one-size-fits-all. Flex, no matter how you look at it, has to, well…flex.

Did you know Maggie and Jake Gyllenhaal are the 11th siblings to receive Oscar nominations? Love them! But while there may not be an Oscar in your future, you can still capitalize on this year’s awards season…corporate workplace awards, that is.

Here are a few (with upcoming deadlines) to consider:

Recognizing Workplace Excellence in Chicagoland
The Chicagoland Workplace Excellence Award is presented by the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce and Right Management.  The award recognizes organizations that improve their competitive advantage through people practices that lead to successful business results.

Here’s what finalists and winners can expect:

• Honored at the Chicagoland Workplace Excellence Award Forum
• Participate in moderated panel discussions
• Covered in press releases and Chicagoland Workplace Excellence Award Forum publicity, distributed to major media outlets and thousands of Chicago businesspeople.
• Recognized before Chamber’s Board of Directors
• Featured on Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce Workplace Excellence website
• Able to participate in on-air discussions with media partners
• Receive commemorative award for display at your workplace

Applications are now being accepted until July23rd, 2010.

The Sloan Awards for Business Excellence in Workplace Flexibility
This prestigious award recognizes employers across the country that are successfully using flexibility to meet both business and employee goals.

The 2010 application for Alfred P. Sloan Awards for Business Excellence in Workplace Flexibility is due April 16. The Employer Questionnaire takes less than one hour to complete. To print a PDF of the Employer Questionnaire, go to the Award FAQ section.

Reminders: You’ll be able to start the application and return to it later to finish or alter answers after you SUBMIT by using the password you select. You will need to know demographics (±10%) like percent female, percent unionized, percent hourly employees.

Working Mother 100 Best Companies Survey
Published annually in the October issue of Working Mother, this award highlights companies that do an exemplary job of advancing women and helping employees balance work and family.

Applicants must also meet the following eligibility requirements:

1. Must offer FMLA benefits
2. Must offer some PAID maternity leave (including disability pay)
3. Must offer some type of flex benefits
4. Must have a minimum of 500 employees

The application will remain open until mid-March 2010.

Now jump over to Life Meets Work for 5 Reasons Awards are Good for Business.

Great piece over at Discovery News late last week, highlighting research that shows flex workers work harder and often longer.  The reason, researchers suggest, is that workers who feel like their employers have given them something special, work hard to give something extra special in return.

Among the findings highlighted, flex workers…

• Work more intensely
• Have higher job satisfaction
• Have less stress
• Are more loyal

One of the article’s sources attributes the phenomenon to social exchange theory–a sort of voluntary and informal repayment system between individuals.  From the piece:

Over time, a series of positive social exchange transactions lead to strong relationships, whether it’s between individuals or an employee and a company. These transactions provide individuals and institutions alike with a way to build trust, since these exchanges usually aren’t obligatory.

Build trust and productivity at the same time?  We’ve found it!  Flex time–the holy grail of employee engagement.

(Well actually we found it several years ago.  But we’d like to help you find it too.  Call Life Meets Work at 1-888-462-LMW1 and we’ll point you in the right direction.)

Today is the last day of Winning Workplaces’s ROI of Great Workplaces conference in Chicago.

The organization introduced its Top Small Workplaces 2009 award winners in late September and will honor recipients at the conference. Visit the Winning Workplaces blog for insight on the winners or view the Wall Street Journal coverage.

Congratulations to the award winners and kudos to Winning Workplaces for its ongoing efforts.

Welcome to October – National Work & Family Month! This is an official proclamation by our federal government people! It’s legit.

The four-page resolution from the U.S. House of Representatives includes 14 “whereas” statements, providing the rational for this official recognition of work/family balance.

Notably, the federal government recognizes the following:

• Employees who have more access to flexible work arrangements are significantly more satisfied with their jobs, are more satisfied with their lives, and experience less interference between their jobs.
• Employees who are able to effectively balance family and work responsibilities are less likely to report making mistakes, or feel resentment toward employers and coworkers.
• Job flexibility often allows parents to be more involved in their children’s lives, and research reveals that parental involvement is associated with children’s higher achievement in language and mathematics, improved behavior, greater academic persistence, and lower dropout rates.

The resolution also includes impact statements regarding the importance of breastfeeding, increased caregiving responsibilities as our population ages, health and safety for our nation’s children, and the merits of sitting down to family dinners.

What the proclamation says nothing about, however, is all the inherent value businesses reap from providing a flexible workplace. Maybe we can get the National Chamber of Commerce to work on that.

For more information and to share your story, visit the Association for Work Life Professionals (AWLP).

The new Working Mother Top 100 list was released last week. We certainly commend Working Mother for spotlighting the importance of family friendly workplaces and we congratulate all those who made the list.

We do, however, encourage Working Mother to consider updating their selection process to include an employee interview or survey component. This is the formula used by Winning Workplaces for its Top Small Workplaces award and by the Alfred P. Sloan Awards for Business Excellence in Workplace Flexibility.

We believe that employee evaluations should be used to validate any company-supplied reporting. For the public, it’s a matter of veracity. For the corporation participating, it’s a measure of effectiveness.

Because while many companies may have developed what is “officially” a flexible workplace, the honest reality is that often times those well-intentioned corporate policies are not sufficiently communicated and/or carried out by all managers throughout the organization.

Significant gaps exist between availability of corporate work/life programs and the rate of employee awareness and usage. In our study of Work Life Issues in America, we also found that employee perceptions of flexibility didn’t match corporate perceptions.

And the truth is that employee perceptions matter most. If employees don’t feel they have a flexible workplace, then the corporation is missing out on myriad benefits they could (should) otherwise be realizing.

Pick your favorite version of this old measurement adage:

• What doesn’t get measured, doesn’t get done.
• You don’t get what you want, you get what you measure.
• What gets measured, gets managed.

Either way, they all apply.

Posted by Jaime Leick

2009 Guide to Bold New Ideas for Making Work Work available now.

Published by the Families and Work Institute, the annual guide features 260 employers selected for the Alfred P. Sloan Award for Business Excellence in Workplace Flexibility. Featured employers are sorted by geography and innovative practice.

Some of the notable practices profiled in the guide, exemplifying what is possible even in a difficult economy, include:

• Giving employees four Fridays off in the summer in lieu of raises the organization cannot afford
• Allowing employees to work at home one to two days a week to save on commuting costs
• Giving employees the option to take unlimited, unpaid personal time off during the downturn, while keeping full medical benefits and the right to return to their jobs
• Allowing employees greater scheduling flexibility if their spouse has lost a job or seen their hours reduced and the family needs to make changes
• Creating flex year and flex career programs
• Creating workflow coordinators to monitor overwork

A recent study by Deloitte (in which executives predict a “resume tsunami” once the economy recovers), found that flexible work arrangements were one of the top three retention priorities (along with compensation and health care) for workers across all age groups.

Posted by Jaime Leick

As children head back to school, swine flu discussion is resurfacing. Apparently the flu did not subside during the summer months, as expected, but continued to proliferate—in places like children’s summer camps and sports teams.

The Associated Press reports that schools are gearing up to become vaccination headquarters, while other media outlets are advising parents on warning signs and treatment advice.

Guidance from the CDC says sick children should be allowed to return to school 24 hours after the fever is gone. However, symptomatic children should be removed from others immediately.

And in Phoenix, Arizona, public health officials are teaming up with local transit leaders to provide a series of employer-focused webinars on telecommuting.

The goal: teach businesses how to successfully implement telecommuting programs so that employees can stay home when they or their children are sick.

The four part series covers issues such as legal concerns, training and expectations, home office environments, and evaluation.

Organizers are encouraging employers to begin preparing now. “In most cases, telework doesn’t happen overnight,” says one transit official.

Promotion on the webinar registration page highlights multiple benefits to employers, employees and the community at large…

“At Valley Metro, we strive to assist employers with choosing the most effective trip reduction alternatives for their employees. Telework is one option that has proven to be successful at companies of all sizes and industries.”

And keeping sick riders off the bus doesn’t hurt either.

Posted by Jaime Leick

A new study by WorldatWork indicates that the number of hourly workers in the U.S. using flexible scheduling benefits such as teleworking is larger than expected.

The study, “Flexible Work Arrangements for Nonexempt Employees,” found that a surprisingly high number of companies are allowing nonexempt employees to telework despite traditional limitations such as work hour and safety requirements.

When it comes to flex and hourly workers, it’s not just a question of how to maintain production/service levels, but how to stay on the right side of the law.

“The participation of non-exempt employees in flexible work programs is much higher than expected, but not as well-organized and orderly as is required by employment law,” said Charlie Grantham, managing director of Work Design Collaborative, the researchers who completed the WorldatWork study.

We heard similar concerns from an employment lawyer at the recent Illinois state conference for the Society of Human Resource Management.

Because there are so many potential legal issues for overtime nonexempt employees—and the courts haven’t ruled on them yet—there could be a natural reluctance by some organizations to delve into flexibility.

Until those court cases are complete, organizations need to look at the old rules and make informed, good faith decisions based on that information.

A key bottom line, however, is that the issues for nonexempt workers have to do with working from home. And we know there are lots of flexible alternatives that don’t involve working from home. So if you’re worried about the legal aspects, come up with other solutions….

…Like the companies in this Families and Work Institute report, released in May. The comprehensive study is complete with case studies and fresh, new innovative solutions for offering flexibility to hourly workers. As we’ve said before, the report is a phenomenal resource.

“As flexible programs grow in both scale and scope, policy development in this area will become a critical human resource management issue,” Grantham says.

True. But with 45% of respondents including nonexempts in flexible work programs, the WorldatWork report demonstrates that workplace flexibility is becoming more of an imperative for employers.

Employers must not let legal fears prevent (or seemingly excuse) them from pursuing these viable, valuable strategies that have been solidly proven to drive productivity, retention, and innovation.

As we say in Twitter, #fail to Forbes for fueling employee fears that telecommuting or other flexible work arrangements may put them on the chopping block for layoffs.

Its piece “Will Flextime Set You Up to be Laid Off?” gives one example of a telecommuter who lost his job when other in-office folk kept theirs.  The rest of the piece trades in generalities and telecommuting 101-type advice.

What we’ve really been hearing from employers is that they are bumping up against a utilization gap.  They still offer flex, but employees aren’t taking it.

Employees either aren’t aware their company offers flexibility, or they are afraid to take advantage of the benefits for fear of losing their job or missing out on a promotion.  (Thank you very little Forbes and Jack Welch.)

A new study from the Families and Work Institute suggests that those fears are (generally) unfounded. In examining the impact of the economic downturn on the American workplace, the FWI found an overwhelming majority of employers (94%) are maintaining or increasing workplace flexibility.

What’s more, 26% specifically used flexible workplace options – from reduced work weeks to telecommuting – to minimize the need for layoffs.

Come on Forbes!  Let’s give our employers a little credit.  They know times are hard and workers are stressed.  It’s more than bad retention policy to clamp down on flexible work options—it’s bad for productivity.

The Forbes piece even acknowledges that flexibility is key to getting things done:

“More than 20 years of documented data show that working remotely improves productivity, usually by double digits,” says Pat Katepoo, a flexible-work adviser and founder of WorkOptions, a resource for career professionals who want to negotiate flexible work arrangements. “People aren’t afraid of working hard. They just want to do it with more control.”

Forbes’ headline was incendiary.  Its advice, pedestrian.  Will someone report on the real statistics please?  Companies Offer Flex to Fight Recession. Sound good?  Nah, let’s just run with fear.  That sells.

Posted by Jaime