Negotiating Flexibility With Your Employer

Organisations are acknowledging that many employees have a greater need for flexibility to enable them to balance lifestyle and meet other personal and family commitments. Access is a high priority for many employees including parents, students continuing their education, and mature age workers planning their retirement.

Flexibility is often a misused term. Essentially it means any alternative working arrangement to working in the office during core business hours for 5 days each week. So a full time role can be flexible as some hours may be done from home depending on the type of work you do.

The steps below will assist you in negotiating flexible working arrangements with your employer:

Step 1: Know the facts

Know the facts. Request a copy of your organisation's Flexible Work Arrangements Policy. Speak to other employees who are working flexibly. Find out how they negotiated their working arrangements.

Step 2: Negotiating flexibility

Whether it is your current employer or a new employer that you need to approach to discuss a flexible working arrangement, it is important that you feel confident and prepared about negotiating a deal that will work for you.

Resource: Flexible work options to consider

Step 3: Business Case Proposal

Write a Business Case Proposal. A proposal provides formality to an arrangement and can be filed for review at a later date. Use the following questions as a guide to include in your Business Case Proposal to work flexibly:

• Why do you need to work flexibly?
• What type of flexible work arrangement are you proposing? So job share, part time, work from home arrangements etc.  (give at least 2 variations in work patterns)
• What would be the impact on your job responsibilities and tasks?
• Can you recommend any solutions?
• What will be the impact on your stakeholders i.e. customers, colleagues, etc.
• What aspects of your role could be done from home?
• Are there any costs or cost savings associated with this flexible work arrangement?
• Why do you think you can work flexibly in an effective manner?
• What measurement criteria can you propose to measure the success of the flexible work arrangement you are proposing?

Step 4: Making Flexibility Work

When your flexible work arrangement has been approved, consider the following tips:

• Offer a 3-6 month trial period. You then have an opportunity to demonstrate how successful your working arrangement can be. 
• Determine what work will be done differently as a result fo the flexible work arrangement and communicate how it will work with your team, clients and other stakeholders.
• Agree to a regular meeting with your manager to monitor the flexible work arrangement.
• Keep a diary note of how things are going for the first 3-6 months. Identify what is working and what could be improved.
• Resolve and tweak changes to the arrangement as you go.
• Seek feedback from team members and clients every 6 months and implement any suggested improvements.
• Discuss any concerns that arise with your manager.

 

A game plan to help you find a flexible job