A Step Towards Remote Working Can Be A Leap Towards Diversity And Inclusion

It has taken a pandemic to wake us up to the benefits of flexible working, and it is becoming clear that some form of hybrid working is here to stay. Almost all of 50 of the U.K.'s biggest employers questioned by the BBC have said they do not plan to bring staff back to the office full-time. Whether they speak of remote working, flexible working or hybrid working as they explore the best options available, U.K businesses are reacting at speed to the challenges of how best to manage the expectations of their workforce post-pandemic, and also cut costs. This is also an excellent opportunity to make great strides on the stalling agenda of diversity and inclusion.

Some 43 of the firms said they would embrace a mix of home and office working, with staff encouraged to work from home two to three days a week, according to the BBC. Four firms said they were keeping the idea of hybrid working, working from home some of the time, under review. This is a trend that has occurred so fast that the U.K government has swiftly abandoned the message to “get back into the office”, delivered by Rishi Sunak, Chancellor of the Exchequer, as recently as late March, 2021.

Instead, the U.K. government has asked businesses to help draw up policies on how to make flexible working the “default option” for companies after the pandemic, and an advisory group with representatives from various business associations has already met, according to the Financial Times.

Concern on the need for workers to return to empty offices to fuel an economic recovery has switched into a wider consideration, not least because now it is critically about “productivity” in a country that has struggled with that word for quite some time. There is urgency too, on the need for a green economic recovery, as the U.K. steps up to centre stage on action on climate change at COP26 in November. One might imagine there is also some concern about respecting - and being seen to respect- the U.N’s sustainable development goals (SDGs).

Sustainable Development Goals via United Nations May 2021

But it is not the SDG’s that are concentrating the minds of U.K business, it is the need for cost-cutting. It should also be the urgent need both for employee engagement and for diversity and inclusion. This is not only a great opportunity for better two-way communication between employee and employer, but also for businesses to learn about the importance of having good data on their workforce, and of using it well.

Four and a half years after Ruby McGregor-Smith did her review on racial disparities in the workforce in the U.K., the recommendations of her report are yet to be implemented, as this article by the FT, written almost a year ago now, makes clear. A striking finding by her review was that CEOs had no idea who was working for them, when it came to race and ethnic identity.

The pandemic has swiftly removed the stigma of flexible working being a “women thing.” Working part-time, or flexibly, has too long been seen as equating to being a less worthy and less valuable member of the workforce. Not only do such attitudes exclude women, but they act as major obstacles to employing anyone with special needs, and older willing and able members of the country’s older population wishing to carry on working. They have unwittingly reinforced gender inequality and a societal expectation that it remains up to the woman to juggle her career expectations with the time involved in the bringing up of children.

As flexible working becomes adopted more widely, it will be interesting to see what adoption of the trend reveals about corporate culture, and how in touch it is with the human realities of its human capital. According to The Global Ways of Working report by Totaljobs and Boston Consulting Group, 87% of British people would prefer a job that allows them to work from home at least occasionally. Among U.K. women, 67% want to split their time between home and office, compared to 54% of men, and only 16% of men want to go back into the office full-time. That number drops to 9% of women.

“It is vital that employers consider the needs and preferences of different demographics within their workforce. Choices companies make now will play a crucial role in retaining talent for the long-term and flexibility should be a key factor in those decisions” said Jon Wilson, CEO of Totaljobs.

The financial services industry includes businesses announcing remote-working policies as an easy way to cut costs, as banks struggle to maintain profit margins at a time of low interest rates. The Big Four accounting firms have jumped at the possibilities as they scramble to deal with the costs of high rent premises and the assault on their working models as a result of corporate governance moves on audit reform and conflict of interest. But the Wall Street banks are worth watching on the extent to which corporate culture dictates their stance on flexible working.

Goldman Sachs has told its U.K. bankers to get ready to get back into the office in June, and cites the importance of “living our culture” every day to its junior bankers and interns. For the bank, and for others who think the same way, the big question will be when does corporate culture become corporate control ? If a business cannot hold together its employees except by requiring their attendance at almost all times, is it time to rethink ?

It certainly seems that male-dominated businesses are the ones that resist flexible working. If the end goal is the best use of talent and human capital then it is hard to see, as the immediate post-pandemic future begins to unfurl, how they move forward. Businesses that espouse their commitment to diversity and inclusion are going to struggle to live up to that commitment without adopting some form of flexible working. As Bruce Daisley argues in his eatworksleeprepeat blog ( see image below) flexible working is a fight towards equality.

Times change, but we can all remember back to when working on aeroplanes, or in business class lounges for the upper echelons of the earning workforce was seen as perfectly normal - it just wasn’t called remote working. But it was considered ok for businessmen (and they were mostly men) to brag about working on the ‘red eye’ from New York to London, instead of sleeping.

Today business trips are frowned upon for green credentials and media reports suggest that Europe's largest banks are planning to slash business travel permanently by as much as half from pre-pandemic levels after the pandemic abates. We also speak much more about the importance of health and well-being, instead of about ‘work-life balance.’

Image credit: Bruce Daisley, eatworksleeprepeat blog

The Office of National Statistics (ONS) has looked at how the UK is faring in important areas of well-being compared with the member states of the European Union (EU) and the member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). All these are considerations that are likely to play into the U.K. government’s policymaking in the medium and longer term, as the “build back better” mantra plays out post pandemic.

The business task force on flexible working has been asked to produce advice for employers within the next six months. Businesses would do well to heed the CIPD Good Work Index 2020, which shows, it says, “a concerning level of work-related poor health.” In the U.K. the cost to the economy of people dropping out of work due to poor health is staggeringly somewhere between £74 billion and £99 billion for mental health issues alone.

Another critical issue that can be embraced by a move towards flexible working is employee engagement. As the CIPD report states, “workers who have voice and choice can influence and directly shape their working lives……meaningful voice helps employees to actively support their organisations.”

Over the last decade, a great deal has been written about trust, and how essential it is to rebuild trust between individuals and their governments, individuals and their employers to renegotiate the contract between business and society. Post-pandemic, it is also time for employers to trust their employees more.

For flexible working to benefit all of society though, the U.K. government must also address the remaining ambiguities of employment and worker rights in the so-called ‘gig economy’, which could be seen as nothing other than a clever exploitation of the desire for flexible working.