Flexible working works for medium business

Employers have given their backing to flexible working in a new survey. Carried out by the Institute of Directors (IoD), the survey of 500 firms found that 86 per cent of respondents operate flexible working practices and that 93 per cent reported they would use flexible working even if there was no regulatory requirement to do so. This fits in with an M Institute workshop held in June where a number of business leaders reported that flexible working was proving important in hanging on to good staff, and more efficient in terms of using resources such as office space.

In the IoD survey, a half said that flexible working had had a material and positive effect on the bottom-line. Productivity, profitability, customer service, recruitment, retention, absenteeism, overhead costs, morale, team working and knowledge sharing had all improved as a result.