Bosses 'afraid of flexible working'

Many line managers are afraid that a rise in the number of employees working from home could put their own jobs at risk, it has been claimed.

According to a roundtable of employment experts hosted by BT, UK bosses have a general resistance to change and are used to managing a team in a certain way, Personnel Today reports.

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Philip Flaxton, chief executive at Work Wise UK, said that those in management positions may be afraid that their skills will no longer be necessary.

They have the attitude: 'If we empower people to work flexibly, how long before we are no longer needed?' he remarked.

A total of seven out of ten employees at BT are involved in flexible working; meanwhile, over 13 per cent are home-based staff.

But according to ClickAJob chief executive Yngve Traberg, working from home can be be a real advantage, as long as managers plan and control it properly.

The same discipline of being on the network at the office should apply at home, he says.

With links such as Skype and ICQ, contact can be maintained with the same involvement as sitting at one's own desk.

The crucial part is managing work-flow so that deadlines are met and productivity continues uninterrupted, he continues.

Which probably means managers are more necessary, not less - in a scaled-down way, applying the same discipline that would be used in working with offices in other countries.