Are businesses missing out by being too stiff?
On 31st March there was a flash mob in Trafalgar Square. This particular flash mob was highlighting the fact that businesses are not reaping the benefits from the mothers who urgently want to sow into flexible working. Organised by Mother Pukka http://motherpukka.co.uk/ in partnership with workspace provider Regus http://www.regus.co.uk/ , the hundreds of participants took to singing about flexible working to the tune of Salt ‘n’ Pepa’s Let’s talk about sex, replacing with sex with flex.
Anna Whitehouse, founder of Mother Pukka, has been strong in making her case for flexible working for parents and carers heard; arguing that there’s an increase of productivity when flexible working is embraced by businesses and also highlighting the workforce miss out on the skills that mums can offer.
Mother Pukka said: “The nine-to-five can be very limiting for many professionals – particularly mums with a young family. This is a call for UK businesses to show their flex appeal – to get flexible and to not disregard talented women just because they don’t fit the rigid fixed-hours mould.”
Earlier this year flexible working group Timewise published a report https://www.theguardian.com/money/2017/jan/30/highly-paid-part-time-roles-employers-embrace-job-shares that found a substantial increase in Executives who are working part-time, with some companies embracing job-shares and consequently highlighting how UK businesses are “tearing up” the restrive nine-to-five working week. A previous report http://timewise.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Updated-A-flexible-future-for-Britain.pdf by Timewise found a staggering 8.7 million people want flexible working but were not yet able to get this.
The case for flexible working is proving to be stronger now than before, it is surely time for a number of UK businesses to reap the extensive benefits the flexible workforce has to offer. UK CEO of Regus said about flexible working: "Indeed, the concept of flexible working is one that appeals to employees across the board – not just those returning from an extended period of time-off. If the focus on returning employees triggers a change to a more flexible approach for all employees, the result will be a workforce that is happier, more motivated and more equipped to produce its best work.”
At Share Your Job we couldn’t agree more with Mother Pukka. We love her drive to push flexible working to the fore. Registering with us could see you working your #FlexAppeal very soon.
Here’s Mother’s Pukka’s previously recorded Flex Appeal video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwYZQz4LJyE
