Want to work less? Business leaders have your back and you don’t even need a good excuse

WANT to work less? These business and employment leaders think we should all be able to, and any excuse should do.

Is golf a good excuse for going part-time?

KATE Huggins thinks when it comes to negotiating part time or flexible work with an employer, any excuse should do.

And the mother of two isn’t just another theorist with an out-there idea about the future of work. As a partner at major professional services firm Deloitte, she’s a new breed of boss who sees the benefits of letting valued employees make their work life work for them.

Want to start a business? Take better care of your health? Work on your golf swing? In Ms Huggins’s book, these are all acceptable reasons to cut a few hours or days from your fulltime commitment.

“It’s a complex and individual conversation, and it depends on the role that this person plays and the contribution they’re making, what they’re going to achieve outside of work in their personal circumstances,” she said.

“But what a progressive employer is going to think about is the added value we get from having the person with that broader experience.”

Using examples of taking a half day each week for a round of golf, and devoting one or two days to a start-up business or study, Ms Huggins said a valued employer, with a considered proposal on how to make their new work arrangements work, would be respected by a good boss. She says she has seen employees take time to work on their own projects, or even wellbeing, and perform better at work.

“There also has to be responsiveness on both sides. In my situation, Deloitte do offer flexibility, but there’s some flexibility on my part as well. If there’s a really important meeting on a day I’m usually with the kids, I’ll make sure I make it,” she said.

Working a 3.5 day week, and one of those days from home, Ms Huggins has seen the value of flexible work reflected in her own performance, and says she now feels more balanced as a person.

“Before I worked flexibly, work was my life, so while I did a lot of hours, not all of those hours were hugely productive,” she says.

“If I’d had a more balanced life then my productivity would have been greater.”

Yolanda Beattie from the Workplace Gender Equality Agency says accommodating flexible work solves more problems for businesses than it creates.

Research has backed up claims that bust the myths around flexible work. A study by Ernst and Young found part time working mums were the most productive of all its employee groups.

But as Yolanda Beattie, executive manager at the Workplace Gender Equality Agency says, employers are starting to view flexible work as a driver of productivity and engagement for other groups as well.

“Flexible work and part time work is not just this mechanism to help working mums, but to help every employee live a full life,” she told news.com.au.

“Eighty per cent of us have kids so a bit part is about family commitments, but a huge part is health, wellbeing, sport and study. Businesses need to recognise to be a good employee, it helps to have a great life, so it suits my best interests as a manager or a CEO, to encourage that.”

Ms Beattie admitted not every flexible worker had a success story, but hours worked weren’t always to blame.

“Not everyone who’s working flexibly is going to be a top performer, because, guess what? There are slackers out there,” she said.

“If you have a performance issue with a flexible workers, then it’s likely you have a performance issue rather than a flexible work issue.”

But Ms Beattie said the outcome-based planning that comes with making flexible work, often helped address such issues.

“Because you have to make it clear what roles are and what’s expected, flexible work becomes a great way to performance manage, focusing on outputs and outcomes rather than time in the office,” she said.

Originally published as Want to work less? Business leaders have your back and you don’t even need a good excuse