Commentary: Singapore employees need to be assured their flexible work requests will be taken seriously

SINGAPORE: As a mother of two children under five, I have been fortunate to be part of an organisation that embraces flexible work. This has allowed me more time with my children, occasionally cook dinner, and most importantly, rework my schedule when illness inevitably hits.

I recognise this as a privilege, especially since many organisations have discontinued remote work post-COVID.

New tripartite guidelines will make it mandatory for Singapore employers to have a process for employees to request flexible work arrangements from December onwards. This suggests that leaders are recognising the need to accommodate employees’ changing needs and new ways of working. 

The guidelines, however, have been met with mixed reactions. The shift towards flexi-work has made some concerned about job offshoring and reduced pay. Individually, employees may doubt if their requests would be taken seriously, or fear that such requests might reflect poorly on their professionalism.  

THE "IDEAL WORKER"

These sentiments are not entirely unfounded. In 2021, a US study found that 72 per cent of managers prefer all their staff to work in office. It also found that more than half of employees think remote work is detrimental to networking and workplace relationships.

Research has shown that employees who telecommute or have flexible schedules face stigmatisation, guilt, coworker dissatisfaction, and career penalties in the form of slower wage growth and reduced career advancement opportunities.

Organisational psychologists suggest remote working could be viewed as a violation of the “Ideal Worker” image - where devoted employees show up to work early, stay late, are always contactable and do not let personal lives “interfere” with work.

Employees who opt for flexi-work policies, whether for health or familial reasons, appear to signal that they are less committed to their jobs and are therefore viewed as less productive or replaceable.

This flexibility stigma applies regardless of gender. A study published in the Journal of Social Issues found that both men and women who sought flexi-work arrangements after the birth of a child received lower job evaluations.

Men in particular faced additional stigma - those who requested flexi-work arrangements were rated as less masculine than those who did not. This could have broader societal implications, reducing men’s willingness to request flexi-work, and leaving women to shoulder most of the caregiving burden.

Even leaders are not immune to the pressures of the Ideal Worker image. In 2015, Marissa Mayer, then CEO of Yahoo, announced she would take limited leave and continue working after delivering her twin daughters. This is despite Yahoo’s enhanced parental leave policies, which Ms Mayer herself announced, allowing new parents to take up to 16 weeks of paid leave.

At that time, Ms Mayer was criticised for sending the implicit message that employees should prioritise work over family. This highlights how flexi-work and other work-life balance policies can backfire - guilt and pressure (from the top and from within) could make employees feel compelled to put in extra hours to make up for “lost” time.

Admittedly, most research on flexi-work has been based in the US or other Western countries. However, evidence suggests that Singaporean employers and employees may be reluctant to embrace flexi-work policies.

For instance, despite its introduction more than a decade ago, only 53 per cent of eligible fathers in Singapore utilise their paternity leave entitlement, citing concerns with career prospects, guilt toward coworkers and perceived lack of workplace support. These concerns echo those related to flexi-work arrangements.

WHAT EMPLOYERS CAN DO

Both employees and employers can benefit from flexi-work policies. The availability of flexi-work arrangements are an attractive recruitment and retention factor across all generations, and telecommuters generally have greater job satisfaction, better performance and lower work-family conflict.

How then can employers plan and implement flexi-work policies to reap the benefits of flexi-work arrangements?

For one, the importance of a proactive and clear organisational policy cannot be emphasised enough. The onus should be on organisations to communicate how and what types of flexi-work employees can request for, and how leaders would support these arrangements.

Some organisations may even consider implementing “mandatory” flexi-work policies, where all employees are automatically entitled to telecommute two days a week on pre-agreed days if they wish to.

Such “automatic enrolment” could go a long way toward assuring employees that flexi-work is not limited to caregivers and reduce stigma regarding flexi-work. For example, 3M’s “Work Your Way” policy across its global offices gives employees full autonomy to decide how much time they spend in the office.

Similar policies have been adopted by companies such as Spotify and Atlassian. Within Singapore, the Civil Service is a leader on this front, where most have flexible start times and the option to work remotely twice a week, subject to exigencies.

One key challenge that remains is that flexi-work arrangements may not be applicable to all job roles, and that could certainly be a source of contention and disgruntlement among employees.

If companies do have to reject a request for flexi-work, supervisors could work with employees to explore more individualised arrangements, rather than completely closing the door on their request.

EMBRACING THE FLEXIBILITY OF FLEXI-WORK

Importantly, flexi-work policies do not need to be set in stone - they should after all be flexible. Companies could commit to doing a “trial run”, to ascertain whether flexi-work policies are feasible based on whether employees can meet defined performance benchmarks over a trial period.

As more employees seek flexibility in their jobs, it may be impossible to return to pre-pandemic days of working in the office full-time.

With research on remote work still in its early stages, especially in Asia, organisations and managers should be prepared to navigate this new world of work. Amid all this uncertainty, some flexibility is certainly warranted.

Dr Sherry Aw is a Lecturer in Psychology at James Cook University, Singapore.