Amid growing employee demand for flexible work arrangements, a recent study suggests leaders don’t have to rush to meet every request. In fact, a significant portion of employees value the traditional Monday-to-Friday 9-to-5 work structure.
Gallup A recently released survey of 18,943 U.S. adults found that 50% of workers would rather choose traditional work hours than commute when they are most productive.
Especially for white-collar workers, the proportion dropped slightly to 45%.
Surprised? You won’t be alone.
Gallup also found that managers don’t know their employees as well as they think, with leaders who participated in the survey significantly overestimating that three-quarters of their employees were “hybrids,” those who prefer to be able to work in both Employees who work on a rotating basis. Work and other life activities throughout the day.
Jeremie Brecheisen, managing director of the Gallup CHRO Roundtable, wrote in a recent column for Flexible Work magazine: “A common misconception among leaders about flexible work is that Employees want to blend work and personal life during the day.” Harvard Business Review.
Employees are divided over work-life mobility
Of course, leaders cannot ignore the other half of their employees who want work and life to blend seamlessly.
For example, Nespresso UK CEO Anna Lundstrom previously stated wealth Having work flow throughout her day allows her to continue completing difficult tasks without being confined to her desk.
Rather than trying to have a strict 50/50 split between work and life, she strives for work-life fluidity.
At the same time, parents have benefited greatly from employers abandoning strict start and end times in the wake of the outbreak and instead embracing a “work when you’re productive” ethos.
“I needed to solve the childcare problem,” Jade Fitzgerald, an experienced design director at design agency Beyond, told us wealth. “Fortunately, some of my jobs are flexible and my son’s day job is not.”
Like many working parents, her workday extends beyond daycare center hours, so she leaves the office early to pick up school and prepare dinner, then finishes work at 7:30 p.m. after her children are tucked in and put to bed.
Ultimately, the mismatch between what workers want and what bosses think they want is too big to ignore.
Gallup found that when employees are not working the way they want, they are less engaged, more likely to experience burnout at work, and more likely to be looking for or actively looking for a new job.
While being able to leave the office early and expect to always be able to respond to early morning or late night emails is a perk for some employees, a similar proportion would rather end their workday at 5pm on time or quit.
This may explain why when Gallup asked chief human resources officers at large companies whether their organizations care about the well-being of their employees, 65% strongly agreed. However, less than a quarter of employees agreed.
“Leaders may feel that their organization cares about their employees, but if your employees don’t feel like you care, that’s OK,” Fitzgerald said.
Gallup researchers concluded that the best way to find out whether employees appreciate any available flexible work policies (or lack thereof) is simple: ask them.
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