Today (23 March) marks two years to the day since the UK first went into lockdown.
Two years, in our working lives at least, which have passed in a blurred Zoom-background flash, and simultaneously dragged on for all eternity. (New memories formed during intense periods of change apparently tend to do that to our brains, especially when punctuated by rather less intense periods sitting on sofas in our trackies).
Along the way, words like "hybrid" took on new currency and meaning. Not - as I like to imagine - as a perennial topic on Gardeners’ Question Time, but instead as a shorthand that belied the complexity of managing an autonomous workforce moving between office and remote working.
Now we find ourselves at another inflection point. With the lifting of all Covid restrictions in the UK, we should start to learn which working practices become the cultural norm and which get consigned to history. It’s a pivotal moment for gender equality in the workplace.
The pandemic penalty
Myriad data points prove the disproportionate impact that the Coronavirus crisis has had on women’s careers. Recently published All In Census data underlines again, at real scale, the barriers women of all backgrounds still face in our industry.
The danger is we retreat into denial or start to see this problem as too big to solve; but the truth is we need to ask bigger questions.
We cannot talk about the "great resignation" or the "war for talent" without recognising the truth that getting more talented women of all backgrounds to progress further and stay in work for longer is business critical for our industry.
Forgive me for wanting to scream: we know which levers accelerate the inclusion gains our industry has begun to make, we just need to pull them faster.
An inclusive recovery
So how to address the barriers women face? How do we empower more men to take the shared parental leave so many want, but so few actually take? And when will we ditch our unholy obsession with presenteeism and reward outputs and outcomes instead?
Far from being too big to solve, the starting point for change is simple. Wacl’s Flexible First Checklist, a self-assessment tool for flexible working backed by 北京赛车pk10 at launch in November 2020, shows us how far we’ve come as an industry and the steps we need to take now to stop female talent walking out the door.
The first year of data (2020-21) gives us a baseline picture, revealing a 50:50 split between companies self-assessing as either competent or highly competent in their approach to flexible working across key criteria, versus those who did not.
Practice eats policy for breakfast
The most salient difference between the two? A commitment to flexible working in practice versus those still circling around policy.
Most respondents had a policy in place, but the companies ahead of the curve are advertising all jobs as flexible (42%), measuring the impact of flexibility, actively encouraging shared parental leave, and role modelling from the top.
The good news - albeit very early days - is that more companies are shifting up that curve, with two thirds of new checklist completions since January 2022 gaining Flexible First Leadership or Standard Marks.
Why we should care
At its simplest: when flexible working is normalised, more women can stay in work for longer, allowing them to progress further, taking on higher-paid roles.
This directly tackles the infamous "glass pyramid", helping close the gender pay gap estimated by All In (on a full-time salary band basis only) to stand at a shocking 24% for our industry, worse than the national level.
And when we act to ensure flexibility is an accepted cultural norm, this isn’t just good for women, there are business benefits for the employer and for all employees, regardless of gender.
For a start, it will help to bridge the gap between the 73% of men who want to take shared parental leave in the UK and the 0.5-8% of men who actually take it (Behavioural Insights Team).
On the cusp of this once-in-a-generation opportunity to reshape the workplace for the better, the time to move the dial on flexible working is now.
How to be flexible in practice, not just policy
Asynchronous, hybrid working means "one size does not fit all": have a playbook instead. Look at deliverables by project and build greater autonomy by team and individual, instead of a rigid, blanket rule.
A Shared Parental Leave policy that is actively discussed and encouraged ensures "pluralistic ignorance" isn’t holding men back from sharing the care. (Pluralistic ignorance is the tendency to hold a particular opinion privately while mistakenly believing the majority of people disagree with that opinion. In this case, the misplaced belief that others disapprove has been shown to cause men to avoid flexible working, anticipating negative social and career repercussions).
Making flexible working the default is a big, positive step. Making it stick for the long term
Leaders need to be adaptive: experiment, listen, act. Rinse and repeat.
in partnership with All In, Wacl’s new is a free self-assessment tool that gives you the space to focus on outcomes, by taking away the hard work of plotting the steps to take.
Mel Exon is Wacl campaigning chair 2021/22