Studies show that employers and employees can both benefit from flexible working practices and technology is making this easier than ever
As far back as 1851, John Ruskin suggested that "in order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: they must be fit for it, they must not do too much of it, and they must have a sense of success in it". Indeed, from the Industrial Revolution until the middle of the 20th century, most people worked long hours, in some cases in unpleasant and dangerous working environments, and certainly did not get the balance that Ruskin felt essential. Post World War II, with the strength of the trade union movement and the increasing concerns about health and safety, the movement towards a more regularised working week took hold in many developed countries. Working practices and hours of work became more standardised, although there were still some exceptions. The 1950s and 1960s were dominated by the male breadwinner, with many women in unpaid housework or in jobs, but not careers. The 1970s were about industrial relations strife. It wasn't until the 1980s that the foundations for the great "work/life balance" debate were laid.
The last 20 years have brought massive changes in the workplace. Jobs are no longer for life, working hours are long, human capital is "mean and lean". Technology has created the 24/7 society, rigorous performance indicators abound, and outsourcing, short-term contracts and the like have radically altered the employer-employee relationship. Employees are, in some cases, seen as a necessary but disposable asset. In today's competitive, long-hours culture, in which two-income families are common, achieving any sense of work/life balance is almost impossible. A 2005 study by Working Families found that 27 per cent of men (and 15 per cent of women) said they were contracted to work 40-hour weeks, but 67 per cent of men (and 54 per cent of women) actually worked well over their contracted hours. Those who consistently worked over 45 hours per week were significantly more stressed and spent less than one hour a night with their children and partners.
Is this kind of working culture healthy for the family, the individual or for companies? Are human resources the most valuable resource, or is this just management rhetoric? Are 60-70 hour weeks good for our businesses? As a director, would you want a surgeon to perform your inevitable heart bypass operation after 65 hours of work that week? Yet we have people from finance directors to marketing managers consistently working long hours under intensive conditions, with little time for their families, friends and community. I thought we were in the era of good corporate responsibility, where employers are committed to their employees, the wider community, and the environment.
The answer to these problems? More flexible working arrangements and more trust. Let employees work partly from home; let's use technology to our advantage and allow people, where possible, to work flexi-place as well as flexi-time. Our service—or knowledge-based economy should enable us to use technology to meet our work, family and community demands. In the follow-up to the Working Families study, it was found that flexible working arrangements led not only to greater job satisfaction and less stress at work but also to greater productivity. Such arrangements require employers to trust and employees to honour their work commitments. If you treat people as disposable assets, they are unlikely to be committed or motivated. Nurture them, give them some autonomy and value them, and you will be pleasantly surprised.
The challenge for directors and senior management is to recognise that developing and maintaining a feelgood factor at work and in our economy generally is not just about the bottom line. It is about quality of life as well: hours of work, family time, manageable workloads, control over one's career and a sense of job security. As Studs Terkel wrote in his acclaimed book Working, "work is about a search for daily meaning as well as daily bread, for recognition as well as cash, for astonishment rather than torpor, in short, for a sort of life rather than a Monday through Friday sort of dying".
Cary Cooper CBE is pro vice-chancellor and professor of organisational psychology and health at Lancaster University and chair of the Sunningdale Institute.
