Management
Executive Summary
Workplace flexibility is an approach that is used by organizations to improve their performance and satisfaction level of their employees. The paper focuses on examining the impact of flexibility of time at work on the business organizations and employees. An extensive literature is consulted in this paper, which reveals that workplace flexibility improves the performance level of the organization, as well as the satisfaction of employees.
Introduction
Majority of the employees, married, single, old, and young report that the increase in pressures in management of life responsibilities and work interferes with life (Kossek, Thompson & Lautsch, 2015). There are also workforce competitiveness trends that include dropping fertility rates, increase demands to care for the elderly, replacement of workers, shifts in the labor market, and aging population. These challenges are overcome through the adoption of the workplace flexibility policies that offer managerial tools for attracting, motivating, and retaining talent. Employees often develop the sensation of being famished at work, which makes them lack the motivation to execute their duties and have poor performance output (Jena & Memon, 2018). The consequence of this is that the organization is subjected to a state of not being able to achieve its business success in the competitive market environment.
Thesis: workplace flexibility needs to be implemented to ensure business success and maximum satisfaction of the workers.
The flexibility practices and policies tend to fail when the stakeholder’s interests are not balanced and respected in the implementation (Kossek, Thompson & Lautsch, 2015). These traps are fairness, culture of unbalanced flexibility, and alteration in the dynamics of work-life. The issues of negativity of workers to the organization because of the lack of flexibility can be managed by ensuring that all employees have access to flexible schedules that ascertains that they can manage and balance their family and personal life successfully, as well as the work that they are doing (Yadav Rangnekar & Bamel, 2016).
The provision of the workplace flexibility aids in the realignment of the workplace to the needs of the changing labor (Christensen & Schneider, 2010). Quality workplace flexibility programs, which are provided without penalties would ensure that working parents are freed and they have the opportunity to devote maximum time to their families. However, challenges emerge where the aging population focuses on going past the conventional retirement ages where they do not need to have full-year work. Proper implementation of the workplace flexibility is vital for the workers and their families, as well as the organizations (Christensen & Schneider, 2010).
A new way that organizations can ensure that they manage their employees successfully is the use of the workplace flexibility (Brown & Pitt-Catsouphes, 2016). Firms are also formulating the best approaches for workplace flexibility to match the current trends in dynamic and competitive global business environment. The current multinational state of work seeks to have an increase in the utilization of the flexibility in locations, hours, and schedules. Irrespective of the barriers linked to adverse productivity effects, manager uncertainty, and monitoring, the expansion of the workplace flexibility is highly compelling to make it complex to disregard. Therefore, having a comprehensive, highly enforced, and efficiently operated flexibility program creates a winning situation for the employers and the employees (Yadav Rangnekar & Bamel, 2016). The employers get the benefits attached to work engagement, increased morale of the employees, retention of the workforce, better outcomes of recruitment, and enhanced productivity for stable pool of talent. These gains offer competitive edge for a firm. On the other hand, employees enjoy a significant reduction in job stress, improved mental and physical health, and better balance of work, life, and family.
The organizational support theory indicates that employees have a tendency of interpreting specific aspects of the firm environment, which include workplace flexibility as key indicators of how the organization supports and comprehends their needs (Jena & Memon, 2018). Even when workers do not engage in the utilization of the flexible options that they have, the understanding of the options assists them significantly (Brown & Pitt-Catsouphes, 2016). They are able to judge the level and the extent at which the organization cares for their well-being and desires. Moreover, the ability of the organizations and efforts to support the balance of work and life of employees improves the commitment of the workers to their jobs, makes them handle their responsibilities at home and work efficiently, and ensures that they are satisfied with what they do in the organization.
Advantages of workplace flexibility
Permitting workplace flexibility gives workers and employers the ability to adjust their workplace environment based on suitable aspects. In addition, work place flexibility assists employees preserve a healthy work-life equilibrium which in turn assists employers upgrade the levels of output with effectiveness of the entire business. If any business entity puts in place a solid, unwavering, and unchangeable workspace, the chance of hiring top-notch talent becomes difficult.
Brilliant leaders grasp the concepts pertaining talent and how it influences the success of a firm or an organization. Without the appropriate talent, a business entity will remain stationary for a long time without exhibiting great results. In order to appeal and retain workers, a manager has to incorporate workplace flexibility in all job duties. Ultimately, workplace flexibility transforms the workplace into a valued place hence performance of the workers peak as workers feel more appreciated and more involved rather than left out.
Incorporating workplace flexibility in careers
When conversing on benefits students desire most, the capability of working extra flexible schedules on a systematic basis is one of their top priorities. What is more fascinating is the fact that awarding young students flexible working hours motivates them to explore, research and come up with sustainable solutions to challenges.
A student should be able to switch between home and school any time of the day. Technologies such as telecommunication enables one to balance work and schoolwork at once without any query or feeling pressurized. According to a research on flexible jobs, conducted in 2016, 3.9 million employees can conduct their work activities from the office or at home. This 3.9 million figure represents 2.9% of the whole American labor force.
Encouraging workplace diversity has its own share of positives and surplus benefits to clients. However, one needs a holistic approach toward diversity and hiring technique- retaining workers may turn out to be harder than fresh enrolment (Rice, 2015). This is a fact for organizations located in areas with less diversity hence minority workers feel disengaged. Furthermore, an individual must take an active duty in assisting minority employees adjust and connect with the work environ and the external community.
Diversity not only harbors beneficial results but sometimes negative outcomes. It is vital to note that heterogeneity among workers or teams may minimize intra-group cohesiveness and also result into disagreements and misinterpretation hence depressing workers’ satisfaction, residency traits, and lower turnover (Guillaume et.al, 2017). On other hand, adequate evidence shows that work performance increases with increases in diversity in the workplace because it improves creativeness and innovativeness via the team members’ varied opinions. The public have slight information on the circumstances and mental mechanisms needed for increasing worker performance especially within groups and dynamic settings.
Diversity in the workplace, from a conceptual perspective means variance existing among people on any features, which may result into observations of one person is different from another individual (Guillaume et.al, 2017). Some of the examples of diversity are demographic features, practical features, personality traits, individualistic values spiritual views, and even sexual orientation.
Consulting local establishments with societal networks such as churches, educational institutions may help employers increase diversity in the workplace. Community establishments assist in getting candidates from various backgrounds thus increasing diversity. One the other hand, a business entity can recruit assistance from nonprofit institutions such as urban league or from internet platforms, which offers information on marginal job seekers (Guillaume et.al, 2017). However, employers should not limit themselves to local areas alone. If able, an employer can go further and expand his or her search to foreign territories. The internet makes it easier for streamlined searches and locating people with unique territories.
Strategies
Increasing diversity leads to differentiated talents, which gives firms an upper hand in terms of competition and recruiting talented personnel. The first tip is writing a job advertisement in a manner that appeal to diverse populations. If one can attract a group of diverse potential candidates, then the language utilized is the only thing that makes the difference. Secondly, coming up with workplace policies which accommodate and encourage diversity is key in ensuring an increment in workplace diversity. In addition, research reveals that organization with flexible working hours and situated in friendly neighborhood assists in attracting more diverse workforce (Hunt et.al, 2017). The third tip is the utilization of personality evaluation techniques during recruitment to enable more diversity in terms of character and background. The normal recruitment standards relies an organization’s needs and the qualities of the workers such as educational qualifications and experiences. In the end, only the qualified makes it through the front door hence decreasing diversity. Therefore, the only reliable way of increasing workplace diversity is through the evaluation of a candidate’s personality, skills, and inspirations. Personal evaluations increase the probability of attaining diverse workforce and influence other function of the workplace positively. The forth tip through which one can increase diversity at the workplace is selecting sourcing approaches which cover diverse work personnel. One of the underlying reasons for lack of diversity in the workplace is hiring through referrals. From an overall perspective, people’s network consists of persons of similar nature. Therefore, the diversity of decreases when a person hires through referrals. Hence, an employer has to search for workers from a public rather than rely on people’s referrals.
Issues that may arise due to increased diversity in the work place
Workplace enrolment organizations have a way of battling diversity issues on a daily basis. Some people are of the opinion that diversity is simply striking a balance between race and sex. Nevertheless, diversity is more than just race and gender parity in the work place. More so, diversity in the workplace enables acceptance, mutual admiration, and collaboration between workers in spite of the variances in ethnicity, age, sex, values, and communication mannerisms between workers (Hunt et.al, 2017). The benefits of having a diverse work place outweigh the minor negatives associated with diversity. First of all diversity causes an upsurge in innovation outcomes due to having workers from various upbringings and demographics. When people from various backgrounds integrate under the same workspace, they may use varied ways of solving challenges and meet target or work goals. In fact, human resource experts revealed that organizations, which practice and retain workspace diversity, perform better than firms with a low diversity index do.
Whereas diversity in the workplace ensures a more rounded work ethic, some challenges may arise as a result of high diversity. One of the challenges arising from a high diversity in the workplace is accommodating foreign beliefs and norms from various people. Integrating personal values from one worker to the next makes it hard due to the distinction thus it is easy to disrespect other people’s opinion and language.
The need for incorporating work flexibility in the
Conclusion
In conclusion, workplace flexibility is an integral item that contributes towards improving the satisfaction level of the employees and ascertaining that there is a better business performance in the organization. The human resource department in the organizations should always focus on ensuring that new and innovative ways and strategies are devised, which will offer workplace flexibility. Such does not only help employees to develop higher loyalty levels to the organization, but also to appreciate the entity for its effectiveness in service delivery. The firm also becomes competitive in the labor market where it gets the opportunity to attract the right talent that is composed of competent and reliable persons.
References
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Jena, L. K., & Memon, N. Z. (2018). Does Workplace Flexibility Usher Innovation? A
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Yadav, M., Rangnekar, S., & Bamel, U. (2016). Workplace Flexibility Dimensions as Enablers
of Organizational Citizenship Behavior. Global Journal of Flexible Systems Management, 17(1), 41–56.
Guillaume, Y. R., Dawson, J. F., Otaye‐Ebede, L., Woods, S. A., & West, M. A. (2017). Harnessing demographic differences in organizations: What moderates the effects of workplace diversity?. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 38(2), 276-303.
Hunt, V., Layton, D., & Prince, S. (2015). Diversity matters. McKinsey & Company, 1, 15-29.
Rice, M. F. (2015). Diversity and public administration. ME Sharpe.
