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Nearly 650 people between the ages of 18 and 65 were shown what they were told was a transcript of an actual conversation in which a company employee asked a member of their human resources department for a more flexible work schedule.
When the employee was a man, 69.7 percent of respondents said they would likely approve his request to either start and leave work a few hours early each day or to work from home two days a week to care for a child. But when the employee in question was a woman, just 56.7 percent said they’d be willing to grant her such a request.
Women are still paid less and therefore have less power in the workplace, no real news there.
It is however plain disappointing that we expect women to work full time and do the heavy lifting in regards to childcare and other domestic duties and we can't even give them the courtesy of a more flexible schedule.
If I take time off for an important childcare need (1 hour!), I'm one of those unreliable women. If my husband takes off an entire day, he is an amazing dad.
If I take time off for an important childcare need (1 hour!), I'm one of those unreliable women. If my husband takes off an entire day, he is an amazing dad.
I think this is an issue of corporate culture rather than sexism. The reason that I say this is because I work in Corporate accounting which is heavily dominated by women. My office has a female/male ration of 3:1. However even here in my office where the Controller and asst controller (who are both females) they get hot and bothered when women need to leave early or come in late due to child care issues. Of course these upper managers don't have kids, theyre married to their careers and think all women should be in the corporate world. So before you go slamming men bear in mind that its more of a corporate mentality than a men vs women. I personally am just now trying with my wife to have a kid and wish we had FAR better social regulations for parents.
Perhaps in the south, but I've never noticed that being an issue in any job I've had in California.
Not in the South either. I'm an admin asst and I have been able to hand-pick my daily schedules since moving to SC/NC in mid-2006. I could never do that when I lived and worked in NYC/NJ.
At my first job in NC I started working 8:30-5:00, then switched to 8-4:30, then switched to 10-6:30 - all at my request and with the blessing of my boss. I loved working the later hours - no traffic either direction. My boss loved it too, since he really didn't get going until 4:30 p.m. as everyone else was leaving. In those last two hours of the day we'd be able to really crank out the work and get a lot done without interruptions. The bonus for me was additional time with my very young children each morning. And I'd get home just in time for baths and bedtime.
In my current job I initially worked 8-4:30 then quickly changed to 9-5:30 when my boss started to frequently need me for things later in the afternoon. When her job shifted in focus, I at some point switched to 7:00-3:45 and took a longer lunch. The earlier time enabled me to get home without having my kids alone for too long once the school bus dropped them off (about an hour). With their current school schedule I'm now pulling into the driveway just as their bus drops them off at the corner.
With my current employer I'm also able to work from home as needed, and my boss is very much okay with my need to do this on occasion.
One thing I think is unfair (nothing personal parents), is that non-parents who want flexible time are treated like they are cuckoo! Like whatever they have going on isn't important!
Quote:
In a twist, Munsch also gave respondents transcripts in which the male and female employees asked for the same type of flexible work schedule scenarios, but for reasons unrelated to parenting — they wanted to train for a bicycle race in the afternoons, for example, or to work from home two days a week to lessen their impact on the environment.
She said that "both men and women who requested to work from home or to work atypical hours to take care of a child were viewed as more respectable, likable, committed and worthy of a promotion, and their requests were more supported than those who requested flexible work for reasons unrelated to child care."
Munsch didn’t break down the difference in terms of gender, but found that only 40.7 percent of respondents said they would likely grant the employee’s flexible work request that wasn’t related to child care, versus the 63.5 percent who would likely grant the request if the reason was related to child care.
I don't have kids, but recently started volunteering at a non-profit. This means that about once or twice a month I have some sort of meeting during the work day.
I know a few jobs ago, when I asked to work from home one day a week, I got denied. I had worked there for 5 years, but that company did not have a lot of trust in employees. The next place didn't have a set work from home policy, so I waited for a few months and then took those days as needed. Then I worked at a company where everyone worked from home (no offices!)). That made it super easy to do errands and such in the midday. My current job (and boss) is even more relaxed about the flexible schedules. My boss has no issue at any point, and it is easy to schedule my meetings! But not all employers are sensitive to this, even though in today's work culture employees are expected to be available at all times of day.
I would like to know more about the people surveyed for the study, because flex hours don't always work.
I can't be the only one surprised that many people in companies I've worked for who have asked for flex hours have jobs where that wouldn't work. Administrative Assistants, Managers without Supervisors, etc. And, to a person, these are women asking for flex hours, but they're in jobs where it won't work. Either they need to be there when their manager is there because they're in an administrative assistant position, or they have a team of people they're managing but have no Supervisor to cover for them.
Of course, part of it could be based on sexism, I'm just not sure all of it is based on that.
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