Making decisions about work-life balance requests
Managers are often concerned when employees request access to work life balance policies. Often these requests are seen as problems rather than opportunities to deliver workable organisational solutions to issues such as attraction and retention and building the human resources capacity of the work unit.
When an employee makes a request to access work life balance policies managers need to consider a range of issues. The manager must balance service delivery and hours of business with the needs of employees.
To assist managers making decisions about employee requests for work life balance policies, a step-by-step guide to deal with individual requests has been developed for managers.
An employee’s request for flexible work arrangements should always take into account the impact and consequences on the team as a whole instead of just the impact on the individual employee’s work. This is of particular relevance when there are multiple requests for flexible work in a team. To assist managers dealing with multiple requests for flexible work another guide dealing with multiple request has been developed for managers.
Granting work-life balance requests
Employees may request a variety of policies to assist balancing responsibilities in their work and personal lives. Wile some requests are dealt with by the employer on a managerial discretionary basis, others have a basis in legislation.
For example, granting an employee nearing retirement permission to participate in a phased retirement arrangement makes good business sense as it keeps the employee in the workplace and allows a transfer of knowledge to other employees prior to departure. However, a request by an employee to re-arrange hours, work part-time, to telecommute or participate in any other arrangement that allows them to attend to their parenting responsibilities actually has a basis in anti-discrimination legislation.
Deciding whether a request is reasonable
When considering a request for use of any work life balance policy a manager must determine the reasonableness of the request. Previously requests for work life balance policies for family responsibilities were determined by assessing whether the request was “operationally convenient”. The Industrial Relations Act 1999 (The Act) was amended in 2006 and “operational convenience” was replaced with the concept of reasonable decision making and this is outlined in section 29D of the Industrial Relations Act 1999.
1) In deciding whether to agree to an application for an application to return to work on a part-time basis, the employer must consider the following:
- The particular circumstances of the employee that give rise to the application, particularly circumstances relating to the employee’s role as the child’s caregiver;
- The impact refusal of the application might have on the employee and the employee’s dependants;
- The effect that agreeing to the application would have on the conduct of the employer’s business, including, for example –
- Any additional cost the employer would incur; and
- The employer’s capacity to reorganise work arrangements; and
- The availability of competent replacement staff; and
- Any loss of efficiency in the conduct of the employer’s business; and
- The impact of the employee’s absence or temporary absence on the delivery of customer service
2) The employer must not unreasonably refuse and application for part-time work.
Although this provision is to deal with requests for returning part-time after parental leave, section 29D of the Act is useful as a guide when assessing all requests for work life balance arrangements.
Under section 29D of the Act a manager must put the outcome of their considerations on the employee’s request in writing and the reasons for their decision. It is not sufficient to make assertions about operational requirements being the reason a request cannot be accommodated.
There is also a body of discrimination case law showing that the requirement to work full-time, or to start and finish at certain times, or to attend the workplace rather than telecommute must be reasonable. For example, it is no longer sufficient to just offer an employee their full-time position after returning from parental leave and let them go if they can’t work full-time. Managers will need to defend their position in detail. Managers will need to show why a particular role must be performed full-time or in the workplace. If the employee’s substantive role cannot be changed to accommodate family responsibilities, managers will also need to show why the particular skills and talents of the employee cannot be usefully deployed in part-time work in an alternative capacity at the same level. Employers are not expected to create meaningless jobs, but they are expected to genuinely consider options for real work that needs to be done. Agencies need to show that they have made a genuine effort to accommodate the employee’s carer responsibilities and not just relied on pre-existing ways of organising work.
When looking at case law, one clear message from the discrimination cases is that each case turns on its facts. On the one hand, employee needs for flexibility are favoured in cases such as Mayer v ANSTO, Escobar v Rainbow Printing or CPSU v CSL limited. On the other hand, these can be contrasted with cases such as Gardiner v NSW WorkCover Authority, Kelly v TPG Internet or State of Victoria v Schou, which acknowledge genuine business needs which prevent acceding to employee requests for flexible work practices.
Guide for manager - individual requests
When making decisions about employee requests for work life balance policies the following steps may be used as a guide. The extent to which these steps are explored will depend on the nature of the employee’s request.
Step One
When the employee requests use of a given work life balance policy managers should try to understand the nature of the request.
Discuss with the employee their situation and determine if there is more than one option. An employee requesting time to train for a sporting event may have their needs met in a number of ways whereas an employee who has to pick up a child from school will have to leave work at a set time.
Step Two
Once you understand what the employee has requested assess whether the request is a short term or long term arrangement. Is the request for a 6 to 12 month transition period back to the workplace after parental leave or are the requested changes of a more permanent nature.
Step Three
Assess the nature and the responsibilities of the employee’s position:
- Is there significant customer/client contact?
- Are there any supervisory responsibilities?
- Can the job/sections of the job be done outside regular business hours (but within the spread of ordinary hours)?
- Can the job be divided?
- Is there a requirement to be present in the workplace at all times?
Step Four
Once you understand the employee’s request and the nature of the position you can explore the possible options to address the situation.
- Can the position be worked part time?
- Can the requirements of the position be fulfilled either completely or in part by telecommuting?
- Can the employee start and finish early e.g. starting at 7am to 2.45pm (with half hour break) to meet their commitments?
- Can the employee work their standard working week over fewer days?
- Can the position be job shared?
- Can two employees work the job part time?
- Is there the capacity to give the employee the full range of duties but fewer of them?
- If none of the above strategies are possible can the employee’s skills be used in another position? (If considering this option Manager will need to ensure that they are not in breach of the Anti-Discrimination Act 1991)
Step Five
Once you have settled on an option you should commit to it implementation principles.
- How will you communicate with the employee if they are out of workplace for any period of time?
- How will the employee communicate with you and other members of the team?
- If there are job share arrangements how will the job share partners communicate with each other and you?
- Do you have to reschedule important meetings so that they occur on a day when the employee is in the workplace?
- How will you communicate the arrangements to the rest of the work team?
You should set a time frame to review the arrangements and revise/amend if you and the employee deem it necessary.
Section 29D of the Act provides a useful guide when assessing employee requests for work-life balance policies. Although this section specifically applies to parents returning from parental leave and wanting to work part-time, it is useful when considering any employee request for flexible work arrangements.
Guide for manager - multiple requests
When a number of employees in a work team make requests for work-life balance policies, the following steps may be used by managers as a guide to assist them to decide on an appropriate course of action. The extent to which these steps are explored will depend on the nature of the employees’ requests. In this example, we will assume that the employees have requested part time work.
Step One
When a number of employees within one work team request part-time work managers should try to understand the nature of each individual request.
Discuss with each employee their situation and determine if there is more than one option to accommodate their needs.
Step Two
Once you understand what the employee has requested, assess whether the request is a short term or long term arrangement. For example, is the request for a 6 to 12 month transition period back to the workplace after parental leave or are the requested changes of a more permanent nature?
Step Three
Assess the nature and the responsibilities of each of the employees’ positions:
- Is there significant customer/client contact?
- Are there any supervisory responsibilities?
- Can the job/sections of the job be performed by someone else in the team?
- Can certain jobs be divided?
- Is there a requirement to be present in the workplace at all times?
Step Four
Once you understand each employee’s request and the nature of their position you can explore the possible options to address the situation.
- Which positions can be worked on a part-time basis?
- Can any of the positions be job shared?
- Is there the capacity to give the employees the full range of duties but fewer of them?
- Can some or all of the team’s work be reorganised to accommodate the arrangement?
- Is this an opportunity to overhaul the way work is performed in the branch and perhaps streamline some processes?
- If these employees go part-time, does this free up enough of the salary budget to enable you to employ more officers to cover gaps in the workload either on a temporary or permanent basis?
- Get the team together to brainstorm these issues. Communication with the team and amongst team members is crucial to make new arrangements work for all parties involved.
- If none of the above strategies are possible can the employees’ skills be used in another position?
Step Five
Once you have settled on an option to deal with the multiple requests you should commit to its implementation principles.
- How will you communicate with the employees if they are out of the workplace for any period of time?
- How will employees communicate with you and other members of the team?
- If there are job share arrangements how will the job share partners communicate with each other and you?
- Do you have to reschedule important meetings so that they occur on a day when all employees are in the workplace?
- How will you communicate the arrangements to the whole of the work team and other relevant work areas?
You should set a timeframe to review the arrangements and revise/amend if you and the employees deem it necessary.
Section 29D of the Act provides a useful guide when assessing employee requests for work-life balance policies. Although this section specifically applies to parents returning from parental leave and wanting to work part-time, it is useful when considering any employee request for flexible work arrangements.
Last updated 29 September 2009
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