Flexi-Time Arrangements and the Possibility to Apply it in the UAE - Essay Example

Flexi-time arrangements and the possibility to apply it in the UAE     Your name:   Course name:             Professors’ name: Date: Introduction The term flextime is derived from a German word Gleitzeit which means ‘sliding time’ (Bohlander 15). Flextime in an organization in United Arab Emirates (UAE) can be defined as variable work schedule which is in contrast to the traditional working arrangement that employees in an organization are required to work, In UAE standard work is between 9am to 5pm. According to William Henning, flextime is typically a core record of the day when employees are expected to be at work from the normal time- between 9am to 5pm, while the rest of the working period is what he called “flextime”, in which employee in an organization can choose when to work, subject to achieving total daily, weekly or monthly hours in the organization of what the company expects, and subject to the necessary work being done in the organization and employee is employed. Introduction of flextime policy in United Arab Emirate (UAE) will allow employees to determine when they will do their responsibility in the organization, while a flextime policy will allow same employees to determine where they will work, for example and employee can decide to work at home (Bohlander 25). Alternative work arrangements or ‘flextime’ that will be introduced in organizations found in United Arab Emirates (UAE) will be used to clearly preferences and requirements of employees in those organization when they will be not in a position to start coping with the traditional working hours of 40 hours/week. This plan on alternative working hours will be implemented in those organizations found in UAE after a plan-workout between staff and management has been put in place. It has been found out, organization which implements flextime management policy will have higher productivity, lower absenteeism, lower attrition rate (Bohlander 25), fewer delays and increased employees morale in the organization. Meanwhile, an organization will have advantage over its competitors because it will be able to retain it productive workers; the needs of an employee is accommodated to the mutual benefit of the work unit in the organization. In today competitive work place companies in United Arab Emirate (UAE) must remain attuned to the needs of their employees. Those companies that do will have advantages over their competitive. One of the tools which can be used by companies in UAE to meet their objectives is the use of flextime. The reason of flextime is simple: it is very popular from the workers in companies viewpoint, a recent survey in UAE showed that 78 per cent of those workers interviewed favored flexible work schedule so that they can get humble time to spend with their families, even if it meant slower career advancement in their field of work. UAE Ministry of Labour In September, 2009, the Ministry of Labour saw the need to adapt Flextime system with the aim of providing nonstop services to citizen of UAE, the variable work schedule that can be found in flexi-time will replace the traditional work practice that was found before in the Ministry of Labour; which required employees in the ministry to work for a specific period of time in a day. The new arrangement in the Ministry of Labour will allow its workers to choose a flexible working hours without disrupting the requirements of work and the ministry clientele services. This initiative was directed by the Vice President and Prime Minister of UAE and the Ruler of Dubai Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who directed all government departments in United Arab Emirates (UAE) to improve services offered to people of UAE so that to attain the set up target of 70pc customer satisfaction in those departments. This directive from the Ruler of Dubai was translated into practice; the working hours in a day was increased in the Ministry of Labour to 11 hours, thus, flextime schedule was also introduced in the ministry to make it easier for the workers; flextime system will allow employees at the ministry to make arrangements among themselves for their work schedules at the Ministry of Labour (Deutschman 24). This new system will make the workers in the Ministry of Labour to be comfortable with work schedule. From the UAE perspective, having flexible time arrangements gives the employees a greater sense of empowerment on their work. Flextime gives an employee a stronger feeling that their organization trusts them. Additionally, in these times of working mums, it will help mothers in United Arab Emirate (UAE) to raise their children more responsibly, it has also been noted that employees who have such arrangements are fiercely loyal to their organization. Homeworking Home working is part of flextime scheme organization operating in United Arab Emirate (UAE) can employ in their operations. This where an individual will conduct company business at home, homeworkers in United Arab Emirate is viewed as are rather viewed as employees who are located remotely to a main office (Allen 34). Their employment in the organization is through an outside an organization that offers a salary to a homeworker employee in exchange for services. There are many advantages that can be realized through homeworking, both for the employee and organization. The employee of the organization will have ease being in a his/her surrounding which he/she comfortable (Mackay 45), it saves time and money on the lengthy commutes of an employee to the workplace in the organization, the worker will be uninterrupted; this will make him/her focus on the work at hand, and lastly, organization which employs this type of flextime system in UAE, means less money is spend on purchasing of office space and equipments, parking space of its employees and other expenses that might be incurred as a result an employee working at the office. Those organizations which operate in UAE and deal with jobs in the Information technology (IT) field are most common positions for homeworkers. Flextime as a result of home-working will enable an employee to accomplish just as much as he/she would if located in an centralized office inside the organization, sometimes this type of flextime approach may be productive because intrusions and distractions at home is less when you compared it to a centralized office which is busy (Allen 36). A study was conducted in 2009 in United Arab Emirate (UAE), it was found that 30 per cent of the women taking maternity leave did not return to their respective employment. Companies in United Arab Emirate (UAE) have a long way to go in helping mothers balance work and family, but it time for companies to adapt flextime to help working mothers. Organization in UAE should adapt telecommute and work flex time; telecommuting is a process that will allow working mothers in UAE to do their work from home, instead of moving to a physical place, this is made possible by means of telephone, internet, e-mail and other modes of communications which are now available in UAE. Organization in UAE should realized the benefit of telecommuting have on their operations; it reduces employee turnover, reduces cost and to the workers it increases job satisfaction. Organization in UAE should offer this option for new moms, these way employees in that company will feel the company cares for them. It have been noted organization who have on-site child care seen the morale of its working mothers improves; a reduction in turnover and absenteeism from work and increased productivity, when you compare them to those organization which doesn’t have the same (Allen 34). A cost-benefit study which was conducted in Dubai Bank showed that on-site day-care program in that institute has saved the organization approximately 150, 000 dollars yearly this is as a results of reduction in both turnover and absenteeism in mothers working in that company. Organization in UAE should but a policy in place whereby those working women who do not take full advantage of their 15 month maternity leave will be able to be given reduced working hours in their work or those employees who don to use their leave will be able to work from their houses or use flextime. Time off in lieu Time off in lieu (TOIL) is an alternative to paying for overtime in an organization; this practice is common to those employees in an organization with high pay salaries who work overtime, the employees in question is often likely to appreciate ‘time off in lieu’ rather than additional money that may be offered in the organization. This concept is whereby an employee will agree to work longer hours during periods of peak demand in an organization, for example in a hotel where the peak period will be when there are many tourist staying in a hotel at a particular time of the year. The extra hours an employee work are recorded, and then the employee can take time off ( with pay) at a less busy time (low period), but there are limits which employer will set on the number of hours an employee can build up over the year and when an employee will be able to take time off from work, as with all forms of rewards for overtime in an organization, ‘time off in lieu’ needs to be careful managed and ground rules should be set out clearly for those organizations in United Arab Emirate (UAE) want to adapt it. One of the main disadvantages of ‘time off in lieu’ is the accumulated of owed time by the employee can amount to several weeks by the end of a year, but this problem can be overcome in the organization such as: an employee can set a limit to ‘time off in lieu’, for example an employee is not allowed to accumulate more than 48 hours/month, and the ‘time off in lieu’ accumulated in a month must be taken in the following month. No employee entitlement can be carried forward without prior agreement between an employer and employee; any entitlement not taken in the right period will be lost. However, regardless of the position in an organization, ‘time of in lieu’ they must be an agreement in writing between an organization and its employees, and it should not be assumed or enforced by either side of the divide in the organization (Deutschman 14). Shared Jobs Companies in United Arab Emirates (UAE) should realized not all flextime involves working less time or different days, sometimes workers in the organization can share the work allocated by the company. The workers in the organization who wish to share work must be given an opportunity to write a lengthy proposal spelling out, in detail, how it will all work in the company (Appelbaum 21). For example, how long work shared will last and what will happen if one of the partner leaves or goes on leave. Such a document in an organization is a good planning tool for any employee wanting to share their work, the key for any shared work is good communication between partners who are responsible for allocated job (Appelbaum 21). Compressed hours This is whereby an employee in an organization will work his/her total number of contracted hours in a week in fewer days than usual number of days that he/she is required to each week but the individual days are longer in the organization in which the employee is working in. An employee in an organization will either start working early than he/she is required or finishing his work late, the employee is able to build up additional hours in a day. For example, instead of an employee working for 40 hours/week over five days, an employee could ask the organization to work the same numbers of hours in less than four days. If employees in an organization choose compressed working hours, this will lead to longer hours on some days. Management in the organization need to ensure employees in that organization are clearly aware of this, both the employees and employers should come up with an effective way that will make the employees focus and productive so that they can avoid job monotony and being stress with work. One way an employer can be able to prevent stress and job monotony on his workers is to draft a task list that will include the variation of tasks across the week that may require different skills to avoid work becoming monotonous to the employees. Part-time working Part time working means an individual in a company is contracted to work less than the normal full time hours that is required. For any organization, part time employment is an effective way to keep the cost of the organization down in areas where the organization does not need a full time cover, at same time the organization is able to attract a wide pool of talented staff to fill vacancies and build in flexibility so that the organization can respond to changes in demand and development in the business. There are many benefits which is associated with an organization employing part-time workers, such as: it is an efficient way to keep costs down in areas where the organization does not need a full time cover, the organization is able to increase recruitment and retention of employees by offering friendly working hours, It will give the organization chance to bring in highly trained experienced employees members even if the organization have a fixed budget and cannot be able to hire someone on a full time basis. The organization will be able to expand the pool of potential recruits, because part time employment will attract skilled parents with younger children and older people who may not want to work on a full time basis in the organization, thus the wealth of skills, experience and expertise will be brought by the part time hired employee. The organization in UAE will be able to respond to changes and peaks of demands, for example the organization can hire more workers at peak times and extend the working hours of the organization by using part time workers in the odd hours and/or at weekends. Lastly, part time employment will help the organization to reduce the workloads of it employees, for example, when the organization doesn’t have enough work for new full time position but it regularly hire part time workers to meet the demands of the organization; this will help the organization reduce the overtime costs, at same time help the organization prevent the negative effects of stress and fatigue in its employees. Annualized hours The annual total hours is agreed between the employer and employee. The employee is able to average his/her working time across the year, in other words an employee in an organization is able to work a set number of hours per year rather than per week. Normally, the number of hours in a year is split into core hours that an employee in an organization will work each week and unallocated hours, an employee will work in peaks hours that there is much demand (Mackay 34). For example if an organization is very busy between January and April, an employee could work extra hours during that period. An employee could then reduce his/her working hours during May to September when work is less busy. Recently annualized hours have become more popular in the banking and financial services industries, because they have moved toward customer services in the form of call centre base operations (Mackay 34). Staggered hours In staggered hour’s schemes, the employees in an organization will start and finish work at slightly different times in a day. This type of a scheme will sometimes it will allow employees in the organization some discretion, within prescribed limit, in fixing the time in which the employees start their work and the time in which they finish their work. However, once the management in an organization has chosen starting and finishing times, they remain unchanged. This scheme represents one way of easing problems of work congestion and over burdened in the organization. Instead of employees in an organization come and leave work practically at the same time, different activities in the organization could be adopted so that different starting and finishing times should be known. This scheme will enable employees in an organization to have easy time in accessing cafeterias, childcare facilities and other services that are important to an employee in the organization (Lou Coates 45). Lastly, staggered hours scheme part time employment will help the organization to reduce the workloads of it employees, for example, when the organization doesn’t have enough work for new full time position but it regularly hire ‘staggered hour’ workers to meet the demands of the organization; this will help the organization reduce the overtime costs, at same time help the organization prevent the negative effects of stress and fatigue in its employees. Conclusion Flextime in an organization makes it easier for workers to attend to personal matters, since many services are primarily being offered during the day. When an employee in an organization is able to have some flexibility when he/she comes to work not only diminishes the problem of work scheduling, it also diminishes other problems an employee will have like traffic jam. Reducing traffic jam will means reducing the time spent and employee travel to and from work, for many employees, this will make work better because stress that is associated with traffic jam or travelling to work will be reduced, it also reduce anxiety in employees and in return its increases job satisfaction to employees in the organization. The time spent not travelling by employees in the organization can be used for work or play. Another advantage of flextime is that it gives employees in an organization greater sense of personal responsibility and opportunity for an employee to participate in decision making. To a manager, when his/her employees are happy with flextime arrangement, then it will make the manager work to be easier. Flextime usually produces improved productivity in the organization and employees will have high morale, but if it is properly managed. It is important for any organization which wants to adapt to flextime, to negotiate a clearly defined set of responsibilities to its employees rather than simply fixing the days or hours without consultations. Work Cited Allen, Sheila. Homeworking: myths and realities. London: Macmillan Education Publisher, 1987.Print. Appelbaum, Eileen. Shared work, valued care: new norms for organizing market work and unpaid care work. London: Economic Policy Institute Publisher, 2002.Print Bohlander, George. Flextime--a new face on the work clock.Los Angeles: Institute of Industrial Relations Publisher, 1977. Print. Deutschman, Alan. Pioneers of the New Balance. London: Fortune, 1991. Print. Lou Coates, Mary. Part-time employment: labor market flexibility and equity issues. London: Queen's University Publisher, 1988.Print. Mackay, William. Flextime: a new approach to the workweek. New York: Employment Planning Division, Bureau of Employment & Training Publisher, 1977.Print. Read More