Flexible Working and Psychological Contract
When the firm is hiring employees in its organisation they first agree on terms and condition of what is expected of the parties involved. The parties involved are the employee, employer, the customer or even the government. To improve the efficiency of the employees, there have been efforts to make them more productive. One of these trends is the introduction of flexible working and psychological contracts. The aim of this report to create awareness of new aspects essential for leading and controlling employees efficiently for better firm financial performance, competition and success. The report will describe in details how flexible working and psychological contracts are implemented in organisation point out the implication behind these trends. The objective of this report is to create awareness of and give recommendations on how flexible working and psychological contract that can be implemented to achieve the very best result from applying these two trends.
1.Flexible Working and Psychological Contract
Flexible Working
The word flexible working refers on how the firm’s organisation on its working schedule, place work and the pattern of doing the job in a way that it accommodates the needs of workers by providing flexible working time (Mon et al. 2016, pp.150). For instance, where there is no fixed start and finish time of the job and even where the firm enables the employee to work when away from the firm’s premises. The flexible working could also be used to define practices such as a shift swapping, employee self-rostering or having time off to attend training (Hall et al, 2017,pp.7).
According to a survey by CIPD on flexible working, the following are examples of flexible working practices by some employees :Part-time. This where the employee allows the worker to work lesser time than the full-time hours. Term-time. Where the worker under a permanent contract is allowed to take leave during the holidays : Job-sharing. This where the firm allows two or more employee to share the responsibility for the particular job among themselves: Flextime. This enables the employee to work on his/her appropriate time where he/she set when to begin and end work. Mobile working/teleworking: this allows the employees to work away from the firm premises. It enables the worker to work still at home or even in remote areas away from the workplace.
Factor that motivates and encourages flexible working
There following are factors that motivates and encourages flexible working. They occur in the following scenarios; Where demand for better work-life balance is high,When the firm wants to give out services on a 24/7 basis, Improved technology that enables the worker to work remotely and Different profiles involvement in the workforce which includes the young and ageing population. (Kultalahti and et al, 2014, pp.570)
The psychological contract is as an agreement between the employer and employees on business terms that are imprecise and informal that is agreed on upon during the performance evaluations and the recruitment process (Alcover, Rico, Turnley and Bolino, pp.18). The contract differs from the legal agreement which is different from the formal contract which gives only a limited and uncertain illustration of the nature of the employment where their employee may have little say in terms which leads to this contract (Lv and Xu, 2018, pp.1258). For examples, some psychological contract is when the firm allows some worker to end work before the time stipulated in the legal agreement or when the firm offers free transport to workers. Some companies also allow workers to go for a holiday during off-peak seasons. According to CIPD, the followings key a point related to psychological contract as identified by Guest (Guest, 2016, pp.136):The psychological contract will be influenced by the extent the administration will implement workers management, The contract is well established when the employer is fair and built trust among his/her employees and when the employer is striving in honouring the deal between them,If the contrite psychological act, the s other optimistic, improved worker obligation and fulfilment will result in an encouraging effect on firm performance.
Impact of Flexible Working and Psychological Contract in The Firm
Sometimes the employer may break the psychological contract due to various reasons that result to the following demerit to an organisation (Chory et al., 2016, pp.41): Poor job satisfaction among the employees, Poor an engagement of employees in decision making and Poor employees’ performance.
The psychological contract was brought out by uncertainties round work insecurity(De cuyper et al., 2017, pp.42). The administration ought to certify that the agreement is kept by expounding what they are offering, looking on employee needs on a regular basis, accomplishing its commitments as per contract and clearing any wrong occurrence in the firm. The worker engagement plan gives an advantageous framework in which the organisation operates from where their better employee satisfaction (Bryson, 2018).
The flexible working and psychological contract are evident in my former place work that was the Bank Sohar in Oman. Regarding flexible working, the bank used part-time working and job-sharing working. A part-time job is where the company or a firm allows its employees to work lesser time than the full time stimulated for full-time operation(Sullivan and Carraher, 2018). The Bank allowed some workers to do their job either during the daytime or during the time. The employee who opted to work during the day didn’t have to be in the firm during the night. Job sharing mechanism is where two or more workers work in one position in the firm either during the same time or during a different time of the day (Burkin and Wexler, 2016,pp.406). It mainly helps when the work is too many mostly in peak period when one employee cannot manage one position alone or when the employees are many and to accommodate them they have to share this position. In the Sohar Bank, employees used to share post during the peak hours when the number of customers is high.
The job sharing was also evident when employee shared same post by shifting whereby one works at daytime and the other during the night. The mechanism was to help in maintain the normal flow of process in the bank during the busy hours when the number of customers were many. It also encouraged 24/7 operation of banks process. In the firm, the women were working more flexible than men who tend to work full-time. The firm mostly considers women to work on a flexible scheduled compared to men having the assumption that women had a family to cater for them. The flexible working had many advantages toward the firm such as the satisfaction of working days and time that enables the employees to work to their best thus doing best work leading to improved work efficiency of the firm. Better flexible working allows the firm to operate during the day or the night to cater the needs of its customer in anytime thus helping the bank to have a better reputation in the market thus increasing its customers that will enable the bank to grow (Jin et al., 2016, pp.515). Flexible working also enables the employee to feel being part of the firm, and thus he/she can air his/her view or query very quickly and openly.
In Bank Sohar, the psychological contract was viewed as the priorities for employees in the organization. The worker was exposed to be the better working condition and worked using the appropriate apparatus. The bank uses the current technology and equipment such as better computer and its related equipment to make the work easier for the employees. The firm also did promote the employees fairly according to their performance e and their determination in their place of work. The firm did promote Khalil Salim Al Hedaif to be in charge of retail banking. The employees in the bank has the priority of accessing loans in the bank to enable them to improve their lives or in case of emergency or personal needs.
According to CIPD, the psychological contract has many impacts on every organisation. One of the effects is fairness in its processes where the administration carried its operations fairly for example during its promotion session it awards the hardworking employees with more significant responsibility. The contract also creates a channel for communication where the employees can quickly raise their view and query. The deal enables the firm to work with satisfied workers who work to their best as a result of better working conditions in the firm.
Conclusion
Through the research, I realise that my former place of work has been implementing a flexible working and had a psychological contract in their day-to-day work practices. I recognized flexible working practices such as part-time job and job-sharing in the firm. The psychological agreements are the priorities extended to employees mostly acting as a motivation factor (Caldwell and peters, 2018, pp.29). These priorities include fairness in the firm’s practices and added advantages such as access to loans and better working equipment and better working place. My former place of work lacked the satisfaction of the employees regarding the salaries they received. It didn’t motivate the employees to work hard, and the firm gave little on matters to do with the training of employees to improve the skills.
Finally, the firm didn’t take much time and resources to involve itself in the social life of the employees during events such as wedding and burial of one of the employees and allowing men and women to have the same chance of having a flexible working schedule. The firm should consider increasing or salaries of the employees, enable men to have an equal opportunity of flexible working practice, attend or involve itself in the social lives of its employees. Increasing their wages will allow the workers to work without the pressure of looking for another source of income which may prompt the worker to steal from the organisation. The firm should organise training for its employees to improve their skill which will lead to better performance of the employees (Epstein, 2018). Involvement of the firm on the social lives of employees will raise the sense of belonging to the worker to that firm and will act as motivating factor.
Reference
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