The nature and pattern of family-friendly employment policies in Britain

Description

There has been growing interest in family-friendly working arrangements, often referred to as work-life balance policies. While the statistical picture of the extent of such flexible working arrangements is now fairly well charted, there are many questions left unanswered. In particular, there is need for a more detailed understanding of employers' motivations for offering flexible working and the outcomes of different policies and practices for both employers and employees. This report draws on data from a large-scale national survey of workplace employee relations (WERS) to fill these gaps in our knowledge and understanding. It is the first time these issues have been explored through analysis of such a large and representative sample of companies and employees. Questions asked include: Which employers offer flexible working arrangements to their employees? Which employees are entitled to access these provisions? What are the main drivers that motivate organisations to adopt the family-friendly policies they have chosen? Are business outcomes and performance influenced by family-friendly policies ? The findings will be invaluable to human resource managers, owners and managers of companies of all sizes, policy makers in central and local government, as well as academics, students and researchers with an interest in industrial relations, human resource management, and work and family life.

Shirley Dex is a Principal Research Fellow at the Judge Institute of Management Studies, University of Cambridge. Colin Smith was formerly a Research Fellow in the ESRC Centre for Business Research and the Geography Department, University of Cambridge. He currently works in the Government Economic Service.