Flexible work means different things to different people

Flexibility at work means many different things

New the Standard Life Centre for the Future of Retirement research, conducted by Message House, highlights how flexible work means different things to different people¹.

Top 3 flexible working priorites for how people want to work in the future

Flexibility at work means many different things

Supporting part-time hours in the workplace 

The range of possibilities about what flexible working means to different people alongside the legislative change giving people the right to request flexible work from day 1 of employment means employers should be equipping their workforce to have more and better conversations about flexible work. This is particularly important for growing access to good quality part-time work. Research conducted by Timewise found some persistent negative perceptions about part-time work, particularly in relation to it limiting career progression and amongst people in managerial and professional occupations.  

To help these tackle perceptions the Standard Life Centre for the Future of Retirement research tested how appealing people find different ways of describing someone who works 21 hours a week.   

A factual description such as ‘3 days a week worker’ was just as appealing as ‘part-time’ and ‘flexible’ worker with 2 out of 3 respondents found those descriptions appealing.  Balancing employment and other commitments also tested well.  

Only 37% of people found the term ‘reduced hours worker’ appealing. This makes it the description with the least appeal (of those we tested) and also the one with the strongest level with one in three people saying it is ‘not appealing’.   

The number of people formally working part-time in the UK, hasn’t changed since the pandemic. The majority of these 8 million part-time workers remain predominantly in low skilled jobs, and are women. This is a major contributing factor to the gender pension gap. Opening access to good quality part-time working options in more secure and higher-skilled occupations is critical to closing this savings gap. 

The concept of the 8 hour working day is over 200 years old.  Now is the time for employers and managers to be much more imaginative about how to flex their requirements of when and how long people can work in a week, month or year, if the legislative change is going to make a meaningful difference.

Resources

1. The Standard Life Centre for the Future of Retirement research, conducted by Message House, quantitative research conducted in Jan 2024 amongst 1500 nationally representative UK adults.