Despite employees claiming flexible working is the answer to a good work-life balance, dads being able to spend more time with their children and being viewed as the most popular method of working in the future, less than a fifth of jobs advertised last year (2018) mentioned flexible working.
Research conducted by Timewise, a flexible working consultancy called the Flexible Jobs Index has revealed that only 15 per cent of jobs advertised last year mentioned flexible working. This is a rise from 9.5 per cent in 2016 but still does not match employees’ desires.
Timewise has estimated that 87 per cent of UK employees want some form of flexibility. It also highlighted that jobs with a salary ranging from £20-59,000 have the lowest proportion of flexible jobs advertised (14 per cent). As well as, jobs with this salary representing a third of the postings.
Jobs paying between £14-19,000 have the highest proportion of flexible working options, at 23 per cent rising from 20 in 2016.
Employees earning over £60,000 witnessed the highest growth from 5 to 15 per cent in four years.
Karen Mattison, co-founder of Timewise believes flexibility should be mentioned as much as salary when a job is advertised.
Ms Mattison said:
Historically, everything defaults to Monday to Friday 9-5, and you need to ‘earn your stripes’ before anything shifts, but that is the kind of flexibility that keeps people where they are.
Claire McCartney, diversity and inclusion adviser at the CIPD, said:
They can encourage cultural change as well through leading by example and acting as flexible working role models.
The CIPD is committed to promoting greater take-up and access to flexible working across all occupations and sectors, but this will take substantial cultural change.
The vast majority (86 per cent) of HR roles that were advertised last year had no mention of flexible working in the posting.
The Index is based on the research of six million job ads across 450 job boards to see if flexibility is mentioned at all.
Darius is the editor of HRreview. He has previously worked as a finance reporter for the Daily Express. He studied his journalism masters at Press Association Training and graduated from the University of York with a degree in History.