How to Make an Effective Flexible Work Schedule

The idea of having flexible work schedules was not that popular previously but has gained a lot of attention these days. Every manager and office worker is interested in knowing the details about the flex time work schedule and flexible working hours. We know that as an office worker, you are also interested in knowing the details of this schedule.

We have shared a detailed guide below that will help you know more about how you can have a flexible workday. For most managers, one of the major challenges at work is adapting workplace flexibility because they don't usually know how they can do it right. We, therefore, have discussed the relevant ways in which you can make this flextime work schedule work for your team. Let’s first have a look at what a flexible work schedule is exactly.

What Does Flexible Work Schedule Mean?

A flexible work schedule is the one where the employees have the liberty to choose their working hours. You are not required to work for 40 hours every week; instead, if you are able to complete your work in 15-20 hours every week, you can have a lot of spare time for your other tasks.

You get the opportunity to decide your start and end time; you can choose any specialized slot that is suitable as per your productivity. The total number of hours for every week is fixed, but you can choose which set of slots will work for you. These slots are usually assigned by consulting with the employee supervisor, who has a better idea of the type of work that needs to be completed by the team.

Previously, the organizations introduced the idea of having a 7 am-4 pm work schedule where the workers came early and left early. However, this work schedule did not offer the desired flexibility to most of the workers. The recent covid-19 pandemic has introduced the most flexible working culture that involves the idea of getting the hybrid work model.

In this work schedule, both the workers and the manager have the liberty to come to work at the office whichever day they find suitable and do the remaining work at home or as collocated workers. Currently, there are various freelance options and remote jobs that can help you earn entirely via online means.

Why is the Flexible Work Model Better Than Normal Work Schedule?

Flextime work schedule is suitable for both office workers and managers, so everyone finds it pretty convincing to adopt it in their organization when doing a return to work plan. If you know the exact benefits that you can avail by adopting it in your working routine, you can judge this much better than how fruitful can the flexible working hours be for your business and your team.

Since this sort of work setup gives you the liberty to choose your own starting and end time as a worker, you can finally have the opportunity to evaluate which specific slot is the one where you are most productive. You often waste hours at the office talking with colleagues, using social media, and procrastinating, just because those hours are not the ones when you are most productive. Once you have an idea of your circadian rhythm, you can have a flexible workday.

It is usually noticed that a flexible work schedule tends to boost the productivity of the team. Besides using some smart office furniture like a standing desk or office ergonomic chair to boost productivity, as a manager, you can even use this method to retain more skilled workers and raise your team's output. Flexible schedules in the workplace help develop a better understanding between the manager and office workers and develop a healthy working environment. When your employee stays happy and productive, you see an overall better image of your team that is all set to generate higher revenues.

How to Get an Effective Flexible Work Schedule?

By now, you know what is a flexible schedule, and how it can be beneficial for you and your team. The next step is to understand how you can add it to your office and get the most out of it. Since you will be planning to have an effective flexible working model, it would help if you understand that you might have certain challenges that are associated with the communication gap.

Nevertheless, you can always overcome them by having a regular follow-up and have online sessions and portals where workers can interact with one another to have better communication skills. Having all that, it will be best if you first start this schedule as a pilot project and test it on a smaller team. This will help you evaluate how far flexible work schedules are suitable for your team.

As an office worker, you can even get the golden opportunity to have this schedule if you outperform your colleagues and surpass your manager's expectations. You can do that quite conveniently by managing your time efficiently, getting a bigger picture of your tasks, and setting goals accordingly.

The Bottom Line

Once you are aware of the right ways of creating effective, flexible work schedules, you are all set to adopt them in your office setup. Since the future of work is thought to be remote in more or less every business that is operating currently, you should have an in-depth analysis and discrete evaluation of your hybrid workforce that will help you reach a conclusion to set the right work schedule for them.