Trust us, we're flexible!

As the Government's introduction of additional family-friendly policies in April of this year would suggest, flexible working is here to stay.

But such a radical change in our ways of working also requires a corresponding change in the culture of our organisations and managements. And in some companies that may yet be a long time coming, according to a new survey.

Research by LogicaCMG says that managers are less than trusting when it comes to employees working on the move.

Organisations are wary of mobile working, it seems, because they have no way of monitoring what work has been done. As a result, many companies are still refusing to allow employees to work on the move.

Carried out among senior managers and HR directors in British, Dutch, French and German companies, the research reveals that 45 per cent of HR directors are concerned about their employees' self-discipline to work effectively whilst out of the office.

In addition, most companies' mobile communications policies and strategies were found to be lagging behind the technology they are intended to cover.

Even among those companies that encourage mobile working, it was found that most rely on rudimentary ways of monitoring staff performance such as logging mobile phone or Internet use and written reports to line managers.

"There is an irrational suspicion that if employees are out of the office they're dodging work," says Paul Barker, international solutions director at LogicaCMG.

"However, people do need to travel to meetings and the irony is that by depriving employees of the tools they need to work on the move, employers are failing to get the best out of their executives."

Companies need to get to grips with mobile technology or they will lose out on the opportunity to improve business efficiency and reduce infrastructure costs, argues Barker.

"Mobile technology like Personal Digital Assistants, multimedia-enabled phones and always-on network connectivity is dramatically improving the quality and sophistication of the mobile workforce solutions that can be delivered today."

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