The increasing buzz surrounding work/life balance isn’t driving companies to implement practical policies, survey shows.
By Garry Kranz Comments 0 | Recommend 0
Living to Work:Flexible work arrangements do more than drive retention and
recruitment. U.S. chief financial officers also point to broad business impact
as a result of flexibility. Most CFOs recognize “high to moderate” benefits in
the form of increased productivity (75 percent), differentiation from
competitors (72 percent), minimizing environmental impact (68 percent) and
reducing health care costs (53 percent), according to a survey by Work Life Fit
Inc. and professional services firm BDO Seidman. The research is based on
telephone interviews with CFOs at 100 U.S. companies with at least 5,000
employees. Despite the apparent business advantages, only 39 percent of
organizations have formal policies and procedures, thereby making it difficult
“to translate that awareness into business results.”
There also is overwhelming belief that human resources departments can’t be
solely responsible for the arrangements. Three-quarters of the CFOs cite line
managers as critical to success of flex arrangements. Along the same lines,
nearly two-thirds say “work/life flexibility cannot be successful if the human
resource department is the only champion.”
Workforce Management contributing editor Garry Kranz is based in Richmond, Virginia. E-mail editors@workforce.com to comment.
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