The term Flexible Working is generally used to refer to a set of 'working practices, mutually agreed between employee and employer, which cover working hours, locations or patterns of work'. The design of these flexible practices was borne out of the need to attract an increasing population of women back into the workforce during the 1970's.
Whilst embracing the concept of home and remote working, Flexible Working does not generally include the notion of making people and the workplace (wherever it is) more effective, as Advanced Working does.
Flexible Working does include a range of options, many of which have been developed by Human Resources functions such as:
- working from telecentres/satellite offices
- flexible hours or "flexitime" schemes
- part-time working
- jobshare
- compressed working weeks
- annualised hours
- zero hours
- outsourcing
- use of agency workers
- temporary/fixed term contracts
- casual labour
Whilst Advanced Working and Flexible Working have many overlapping themes, Flexible Working does not generally concern itself with making workplaces work better i.e. reviewing processes so that they work better, providing the right combinations of spaces to support work tasks, giving people the mobility within the office to choose the right type of place to work and increasing the utilisation of space.
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