The importance of flexible working arrangements - Emma Cleary

The importance of flexible working arrangements - Emma Cleary | E11 transcript

(Upbeat introduction music)

Emma King
Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Scaramanga podcast, Talk too much and today I'm really happy to welcome a very special guest called Emma Cleary, Director and Founder of Flexibility Matters. Thank you so much for joining us, I really appreciate it.

Emma Cleary
A pleasure.

Emma King
If you wouldn't mind just introducing yourself and giving us a little insight into who you are and what you do.

Emma Cleary
Absolutely. Thank you very much, Emma. And thank you Scaramanga for inviting me to become one of your podcasters. Love a podcast!

Emma King
(Laughter)

Emma Cleary
So I am Emma Cleary, and as Emma said, I am the Founder and Director of Flexibility Matters. We have been championing flexible working, when flexible working wasn't really very cool. So 10 years ago, when flexible working was not that well known, not that much appreciated.

I needed a new job. And I couldn't find a job back in the publishing world that I had come out of when I first started having my children. And the only way I could get enough flexible work or flex in my life and my work was really to start a business. That was all about people like me, who were struggling with work life balance and mainly caring responsibilities.

But not exclusively, but I noticed that there were so many people standing at the school gates, who were all moaning about the fact that they couldn't find a job that was flexible enough to accommodate their children, mainly because they wanted them to start too early and finish too late. And I was just like, "well, why on earth is this still a thing?", even 10 years ago, that there's not enough, there's not enough flexibility in the world to accommodate brilliant parents who are wanting to get back into their careers.

And as a result I have- of having been at home for a long time, it became an absolute passion of mine, that flexible working needed to be put in front of every business owner, I could find who would listen and talk about the benefits of this amazing talent that was really just sitting at home not being challenged and not using- using their talents to do good work in great businesses. So hence, I started... originally in a Franchise Group, and then laterally over the past five years as Flexibility Matters, but always championing flexible working for those who need it. So that in a nutshell, is how Flexibility Matters was born.

Emma King
That's incredible. And I can sort of relate because I have a son, and it was a big thing when going back into work, finding a company that would be very supportive of that. And um, Scaramanga definitely does that. And I'm very, very lucky to be in my position, because I know a lot of parents don't have the same opportunities. So I suppose my first question is really, for anybody that doesn't know or understand, what exactly is flexible working?

Emma Cleary
Well, flexible working, actually... I mean, it's always been the non-traditional working week. But since COVID, obviously, times have moved on. And people really have a better knowledge of it, whether they actually understand how it works, is still an education piece, I feel. But if you go back in history, to- to 2002, when Tony Blair bought in the original Flexible Working Act, it was to encourage more working parents back into the workplace.

I was the first person at Dow Jones, who actually was allowed that flexible working back in the day. And actually, it was the most stressful period of my life because they required the four days, well the five days I was supposed to have worked, crammed into four days for four days pay rather than five.

Emma King
Oh, wow.

Emma Cleary
It was horrific. It was- it was- it was quite stressful. And whether that was me overcompensating or feeling guilty, you know, good old mothers guilt, because I wanted that extra day with my son.

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
You know, we're quite good at guilt as mothers!

Emma King
Yes, 100%.

Emma Cleary
It was, you know, it was the original start of flexible working, but times have obviously moved on. And in 2014, there was the Children and Families Act, which sort of wided- widened the categories of those who could request flexible working so it became a more general thing. And then of course, we had COVID, which literally propelled flexible working through everyone's vision.

Emma King
It changed everything basically!

Emma Cleary
Totally changed everything. And obviously, in flexible working terms, for the best. But the COVID years were not flexible working, they were enforced working from home, which is not a flexible option at all. So I suppose if you if you want to put it into a sort of... category, flexible working is something that's non traditional, i.e, not the 37 and a half or 40 hour weeks that companies tend to work.

It is there to accommodate all. It's not, as it was back in 2002, maybe to encourage working mums to go back to work. And I think my- my mantra, very much, since I started Flexibility Matters five years ago is that flexible working is available to everyone, it is totally inclusive and as a result, it should help people of all walks of life to have a better work life balance. It can be ad hoc, or it could be contractual. But I would suggest that as a cultural staple, for great businesses, it's a really attractive way of attracting great talent.

But unfortunately, at the moment, the line I get told- told a lot is, "well, we're flexible, because we've got a hybrid working." And actually hybrid working is not necessarily very flexible either. So I think in, in my... from my perspective, flexible working is very much a flexible arrangement that accommodates an individual by their organisation.

Now, the downside of that is that if you've got 2000 employees, and they each want a different flexible working opportunity, that's quite tricky to manage.

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
But as an organisation, I would encourage that there are parameters that you can set as a flexible working principle. So that as far as possible, most people will be happy. But it's a non-traditional working week, essentially.

Emma King
Okay, I suppose my next question is, why do you feel it's so important? And what impact does it have on someone as a whole being able to have flexible working?

Emma Cleary
Well, I think you just mentioned it there, Emma.

Emma King
Yeah! (Laughs)

Emma Cleary
That you've got a son and you were attracted to a business that was... would allow you to be a mom as well as being a great marketer. So that kind of answers the question its, it plays to people's strengths.

Emma King
Yep.

Emma Cleary
So for example, I have, I placed a fabulous PA the other day with a very nice employment and HR practice. And they... tell- they advertise not only on paper, but in person, the fact that they are available to discuss flexible working opportunities.

Now this lady who got the job was, she's brilliant, she's a brilliant PA, she's got so much experience. She's returning from having worked in a school because her children were little and she ticks all the boxes. The only thing that she didn't tick the box on was that she didn't want to work full time, she wanted a four day week opportunity. And this particular company were like "you're the best person for the job, you fit the culture, you fit the directors that you're going to be working with, you fit the other PAs that you'll be working with, you are really the best person for that job. So yes, of course, we can accommodate a four day week."

And obviously, with a four day week, it means you get your prorated salary as opposed to a full time salary.

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
Often people forget, actually, if you're working a reduced hour week, obviously you get a reduced salary as well.

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
But in terms of what it means that she can do is that she doesn't have to worry about her children on that fifth day, she can get her life admin done, or whatever else it is she wants to. I happen to know that, I think she's a runner. So she probably goes for a run. So in terms of why it's important: her well being and the company's well being... Are you still there, Emma?

Emma King
Yeah, yeah.

Emma Cleary
I thought you'd gone very quiet!

Emma King
(Laughter)

Emma Cleary
And the fact that you know, stress and mental burnout and yeah, medical sales. So you know, she's- she's kind of got a bit of everything, and she's going to go to do a great job. And they're going to be really pleased with her because she's the right person and the right fit for that job. So I think that sort of answers the... It's all about fit. It's about a request. It's about being empathetic, but it also takes away a whole lot of the worry about how do I get everything done in my life? How do I how do I balance work and life properly?

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
Yeah, this the CIPD, which is the Chartered Institute of personal- Personnel Development, says there's there's six different categories where flexible working can help. And that's all about job satisfaction and engagement, about health and well being, reduce burnout, better work life balance. Transparency, which is really important, you know, the number of times that business owners say to me, "oh, my goodness, it's so annoying people get to the offer stage and then they tell me they want three days a week." I think with Flexibility Matters what we do is enhance that transparency, that so that people come to us specifically because they know we're going to broker flex for them upfront, transparently, so everyone knows what they're getting. And that takes away the stress of a recruitment process as well. But also, it encourages diversity, job access, and motivation and satisfaction. So you know, what's not to like about all of that? If you can get all of that right, you should be working in a really lovely, empathetic, collegiate atmosphere.

So I think those are... well I've thrown a whole lot of benefits at you.

Emma King
(Laughs)

Emma Cleary
But I think it would be fair to say that it is good for one to have some measure of control over how you work in collaboration with your business owner.

Emma King
Yeah, definitely. And I think the next question I was gonna ask- ask after and another question I had, because it's sort of rolls into one. And I suppose, because my other question was, obviously, what's it mean for people with children? We've touched on disabilities and people from, say, LGBTQ communities. But I think as well, from a personal point of view, I have a chronic illness. And it's- was a massive help, when I worked at my previous job I had working from home, working in the office, so it was very flexible, and I could leave when I needed to, and that side of it takes a lot of stress off you and then your mental health definitely improves. And, and it's- and we discussed it in the office this morning, I said, being in an office every day or week, you forget the little things that you would do, while, say working from home sometimes. So, you know, I know it sounds really, really small, but just doing little things. So like prepping for dinner, or doing your washing in between or going for a run or you know, clearing your head, all those things really, really matter.

And I think some companies, I get a feeling of sometimes a bit scared of letting that control go that they believe that they're not going to get the most that they can out of somebody that they're paying. And they sometimes panic that the workload will drop, when actually, whenever I've looked at studies and stuff like that, I always see something positive out of it, there's very rarely anything negative to say about it. So I hope that obviously, business owners will obviously listen to this and read it and share it and and hopefully take something away from it.

Emma Cleary
I think you just touched on very important factors there though. Trust and communication are absolutely fundamental-

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
-to most HR processes, but particularly with flexible working. If you don't trust your people, and you haven't recruited them well enough to trust them to do a great job wherever they are, then I would say that you need to look at your recruitment processes.

I think if you trust your people to go away and do what they have been recruited to do, and obviously, you know, the conversation needs to be a fluid one, you know. I think gone are the days where you had a one-to-one maybe once a year, you know, most have ongoing conversations about productivity and process. And, you know, there's so many tools that can help you do your job wherever you are, so long as you've got IT and connection as we were finding.

But if you trust your people to do a good job and they deliver, then it doesn't really matter where they work.

Emma King
Exactly.

Emma Cleary
But I do think, also having spoken to many business owners that there is a move back to the office for that collegiate feeling for that getting together thing that sort of, I don't know, it's almost like the DNA- DNA of a business that the culture...

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
And the... what makes your business very unique to your business is not about the walls that you sit in, but the people who- who do the work.

Emma King
Yep.

Emma Cleary
So if you don't see each other ever it becomes difficult to create that culture. Because...

Emma King
Yeah, of course.

Emma Cleary
Working together is like sharing a house together, isn't it? You... and whether you're doing the washing or not, you're still trying to be in the guise that your business owner selected you as her chosen colleague. So well, you've got Scaramanga printed all the way through you and you work in the way that Claire had recruited you and it's, I mean, recruiting is so hard because it's all about fit, and the better you know...

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
The business and the business owner and, as a recruiter from a recruiter perspective, you know, the better I know my clients, the better the job I can do for them, because I know who they're working with, what their effort is, like, what their culture embodies. And if that person is going to fit, because that's, that's fundamental to getting, getting it right, and making sure that that person who's an expensive hire, in time and money, stays the duration.

So I think getting to know your business... um, partners in the recruitment process is really, is really important. And of course, flexible working comes as part of the conversation about what it is in the job role that that person is going to do. And, you know, it still staggers me that even in this day and age, only 11% of roles actually advocate that they are flexible, open to flexible conversations. You know, it's just like, why not? And equally if you actually record salary.

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
I think there's statistics that show if you don't record a salary on a job description, that only one in five people will actually respond to it. So...

Emma King
Yeah, I've got to be honest, that was one of my, it still is one of my major bugbears is seeing a job advertisement and then no wage, because I always think what you're saying is, you'll probably see who will take the lowest wage.

Emma Cleary
Yeah.

Emma King
And, or, and I hate when you fill it out, and it says, "what's your wage now? Or what would you like your wage to be?" And I'm always like, uh, I hate these questions. I'd rather-

Emma Cleary
(inaudible) the salaries even worse!

Emma King
Yeah, I'm like, no, just telling me what the wage is. So I suppose that leads on to my next question for anyone- there's a flexible working bill coming in in April, is that right?

Emma Cleary
That's right. Yep.

Emma King
And I suppose how can people find out more about it? How does it work in, um, how would someone go about if they're going to work and they decide they want to put in for flexible working? And I think my worry would be is if I would put in flexible working somewhere and for some reason, they rejected it, on what grounds sort of, can they reject it? So sort of the whole process? Sorry that's a lot of questions in one!

Emma Cleary
I'll do my best. Yeah, April, the 6th the flexible working, or Employment Relations bill is coming into- into force, which is, in terms of what we've been working for and flexible working, is transformational.

What it will mean is that there could be a lot more flexible working requests from employees, because I don't know if you'd noticed, but all over LinkedIn, all over the newspapers if you still read them, but certainly on social media, there's an enormous amount of government advertising, talking about the Flexible Working Act and when it's going to happen. And distressingly, there are quite a lot of employers that seem to be sticking their heads in the sand, and sort of ignoring it. But there are definitely some stuff- that some steps that you can take to make it a smoother ride.

And you know, we're here to help. That's what one of the strands of our business- recruitment is at the core of our business. But we also run seminars, and in-house seminars, to help avoid any pitfalls of what flexible working, and really embracing it, because the worst thing would be to get caught out by a deluge of flexible working requests, because your HR team will just sink.

So the flexible working bill has come in. There's been all sorts of lobbying through the Task Force on flexible working, everyone knows, and the White House and Mother Parker and her team who've really been piloting how to get this through the Commons and then the Lords and to go into law as of April the 6th.

The crux of what's happening is that, rather than waiting for your 26 weeks of probation, you can actually ask for flexible working from day one, which is why we encourage people to come to us and we will broker what that flexible working looks like because I think it's going to take a little while for candidates to feel really comfortable about going for a new job, asking for flexible working upfront.

If you feel completely confident that you're absolutely the right person for the job, and this shouldn't be a reason for not doing, but you know, if you are absolutely adamant that you need to work four days a week or 25 hours across five days or whatever it is or whatever the flex that you need in your life looks like come and have a chat with us because we can help you broker the flex up front.

The whole thing is swinging slightly in an employee's favour. So quite a lot of businesses are looking at this and going, "ugh, what does this actually mean for us?" So it gives, it gives the... um, opportunity to request twice in a year rather than previously, just once in a year. And it also means that on each of those requests for flexible working, a, an employer has to return on consultation within two months. And one would encourage employers to try as hard as they can to accommodate flexible working, and kind of discuss how it might work.

So you might go in and say, "well, I'd really like to work four days a week." And for whatever reason, the business owner might say, "well, actually, you know, contractually you're employed for five, can we work something out?" So again, it's this- its this communication thing. And if you say, "well, yes, I need that fourth day, because my mother needs to go to hospital every week, and I need to take her." Then the business owner will have to go away and think about how they could make it work. And there are six reasons in law where you, and according to ACAS, where you might turn it down. But really the there shouldn't be too many reasons for not, you know, if it was, let's say, rather than taking your mother to hospital for a whole day, you might take your mother to hospital every Friday morning, which means you're back on a Friday afternoon, or, you know, if it's four hours out of a Friday morning, maybe you add a bit more time on the end of each each day so that you don't have to.

So, I was just listening to a podcast earlier about caring responsibilities, which comes in at the same time.

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
Carers leave also comes in at the same time on April the 6th, which means you get one week's caring leave. Now caring could be caring for anybody. So that also is something that employees might want to be aware of. So, ACAS are very clear about why you might turn down a flexible working request. And that could be on cost or you can't reorganise your work that that person was doing, they can't recruit to cover, it has a negative effect on quality or a negative effect on performance or, impacts on customer needs. So ACAS are really clear about that.

So, but I would suggest, in fact that there aren't that many jobs that really could not be made flexible. And...

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
Not many roles, that if someone's putting in a reasonable request for flex that it couldn't be accommodated. So it just takes a little bit of chat and discussion. And it doesn't always need to be a contractual change.

You know, we've been running menopause in the workplace seminars recently. And reasonable adjustments for someone who's suffering for not necessarily forever, that are non-contractual, that are just by conversation with a great line manager is all the flex that some people need sometimes. It doesn't need to be sort of hot and heavy, "we're going to change everything in your contract and your pay and your..." you know. If it's a two way thing and someone's not taking the mickey, then generally speaking, you can find a way that works for everyone.

Emma King
Yeah, I think, definitely, I think it's really important to have that communication. And I've worked with previous companies where I haven't declared my chronic illness because I don't want them to judge me or be worried about how they see me and feel like, I'm not going to put in the effort that I need to for work. And then I came to the realisation actually, whenever I go for an interview, I'm just gonna tell them absolutely everything. And if they don't feel that they can accommodate that, or they're not, you know, they see it as a negative thing, then that is that's on them. And the job wasn't meant for me.

But I have to say every time I've done it, everyone's always been really open about it. And the majority of time they go, "oh, I have that" or,"I know someone who's got it", which makes you feel a bit better, or they're always like "just tell us like when you know you don't feel well" or something like that. So I think it's definitely something that I would encourage everybody to have an open dialogue about and then um, yeah. And having a good relationship with your team is really, really important.

I think you've answered my next question. It was more just advice to business owners or CEO/Directors about flexible working and what... um, how to offer it to staff I suppose and what the importance of it, but I think we've we've covered it, to be honest!

Emma Cleary
I think employees are certainly very aware. I think, talking to candidates, they're much more aware of their rights than they used to be.

Emma King
Yes.

Emma Cleary
I don't, I hope we're not going the way of the US where everyone's super litigious, but I think people are more aware of the availability. And also, there's so much in the news about mental health and wellbeing that, you know, it... the opportunity to ask for flex, because you're feeling anxious at work, or you're stressed, or you're burning out, and being open with your boss about it, or you have a hidden disability that you don't necessarily want to share, or you have other reasons. And I mean, it doesn't matter what the reason is, anymore, you used to have to tell people what the reasons are for flex-

Emma King
Yeah.

Emma Cleary
But you don't have to so much anymore, with the new bill coming in.

Emma King
Okay.

Emma Cleary
It's very much more private, you know.

Emma King
That's good.

Emma Cleary
And I would encourage that, you know, if you can be transparent, it helps have a meaningful and grown up conversation. But, you know, then gives you a bit more autonomy as someone who doesn't want to share everything, to- to request, because it's there to be requested. So I would encourage transparency, because it's always easier to deal with if everyone knows what's going on. But it does require, you know, if you're putting in a flexible working request, because you're poorly or you're wanting to get pregnant, or you have a menopause situation, or whatever else it is. It helps to be transparent. But if you can't, you know that, that opportunity is now available for you and will be from April the 6th to, to put in that request.

Emma King
Perfect. Thank you very, very, very much for your time today. It's been very insightful and very helpful. Before we go, would you just let everybody know where they can find you, like to contact you, and your website and if you have any social handles?

Emma Cleary
Absolutely. So I have them all, although I haven't branched out into TikTok yet.

Emma King
(Laughter)

Emma Cleary
I can't quite get there!

So probably the best way to get ahold of me if you would like to talk more about how flexible working is going to work in your business, or as a an employee, if you want some advice, or your job seeking, is to drop me a note on LinkedIn. I'm Emma Cleary, and I'm Founder and Director of Flexibility Matters. My email is [email protected] and we are on Instagram and Facebook. But I think if you're wanting to get a hold of me direct, then just drop me a note on LinkedIn or on my email and we'll try and help. But I would say that this is something we've, we'd love to come in and do some training with a middle management team or a senior management team about how to really be prepared for this because there's just a few steps that you can put in that would really ease the way and make you feel very confident that you're doing it all right. And we'd love to help you with that.

Emma King
Fantastic. Thank you so much and to everyone listening. If you want to leave a comment on our socials or visit our website, please do and we hope you tune in for the next episode.

Emma Cleary
Thank you so much, Emma.

Emma King
Thank you!