5 clever tips for working less than 40 hours a week

The five-day week is over — from the overseas COO to the midweek hiatus, Londoners are making clever calculations about clocking in. Rosamund Urwin on the new work/life blending hacks.

Time isn’t just money any more,” says Karen Mattison, founder of Timewise. “It can be even more important than that.” Mattison is explaining why Londoners are increasingly requesting flexible working, and why the best employers are trying to adapt to their needs.

The words “flexible working” tend to concur up thoughts of a colleague who has cut down to four days, or perhaps the boss who sneaks out at 4:30pm on the dot to pick up the children. But there’s a much broader range of ways that organisations can offer flexibility to their staff, including compressed hours, percentage contracts and “ultra-flexed” hours. And it isn’t only for employees with children or caring responsibilities: some staff work flexibly so they can study or volunteer too.

Timewise was set up to encourage flexible working. Mattison herself is in a job-split with fellow CEO Emma Stewart (Mattison covers private-sector empl30jobflex1107aoyers, Stewart the public sector). Their analysis showed that while just over half of Londoners have some kind of flexible arrangement, the capital has the lowest percentage of jobs anywhere in the country — 7.2 per cent — that are advertised as flexible and have (full-time equivalent) salaries of more than £20,000. The national average is 8.7 per cent of posts.

One of the difficulties applicants face is knowing when to ask about flexibility: do they mention it as they apply and risk seeming half-hearted in their desire for the post, or once they’ve been offered it, and risk frustrating their new boss and HR? “Candidates often compared it to a game of poker — they don’t know when to show their hand,” says Mattison.

Timewise’s Hire Me My Way campaign is calling on organisations to change. “In the hiring process everything defaults to nine-to-five: jobs get readvertised to the norm, even if the person being replaced was working a four-day week. Companies should say when they advertise a job that for the right candidate they would add flexibility.”

Stewart adds: “The message to businesses is: ‘You’re already doing this, so why wouldn’t you consider it for candidates?’ London has a war on talent — so why not make a big sell of flexibility at the point of hire?”

And what is Stewart’s advice if you’re already in a job and want to switch to flexible working? “Take the solution as well as the problem to your bosses: you have to make your personal business case.”

So here are the new ways you can flex-it.

Jump the hump

A growing trend among senior staff who want to work flexibly is to take Wednesday off, cutting the week into two sections rather than truncating it. Lynn Rattigan is chief operating officer at accountancy firm EY for the UK and Ireland and has worked flexibly since her twins were born in 2009. She stays at home on Wednesdays.

“Professionally and personally I felt that being out in the middle of the week was easier to cope with,” she says. “Lots of things happen on a Friday, and this way it is easier to plan. I check emails on Wednesdays and can catch up on everything when I’m back the next day. It also means I never take too long a break from my children.”

When she first came back following maternity leave she was looking after a smaller section of the business. Eighteen months ago, however, Rattigan was promoted into her current role. “My boss said he’d never had a COO who worked four days before but he set out what he needed me to do, and I thought it was possible,” she says. “We keep the discussion going now, about whether we are both happy with the set-up and are getting what we need. It’s important both sides are regularly having that conversation.”

Ultra-flexed

This means working hours can shift day-to-day and week-to-week, with no fixed pattern. It’s particularly helpful for those caring for an elderly parent or young or sick children, or those who have a disability themselves….

 

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