HRM and work Arrangements:-

Introduction:

Adjustments in work schedules are not a true part of job design since job tasks and responsibilities are
not changed.

Employers may depart from the traditional workday or work week in their attempt to improve
organizational productivity and morale by giving employees increased control over the hours they work.

The compressed workweek:

Under the compressed workweek, the number of days in the work week is shortened by lengthening the
number of hours worked per day.

Organizations that operate batch processing systems (e.g. Oil companies) use shorter workweeks to
continue work schedules with production schedules.

Compressed work weeks may assist with scheduling arrangements by improving plant equipment
utilization

The keying of work schedules to processing time for a specific operation rather than to standard work
week reduces start up and closedown time and often results in higher weekly output.

Two advantages:

1 It accommodates the leisure time activities of employees and facilitates the employees scheduling of
medical, dental and other types of personal appointments.

2It includes the improvement of employee job satisfaction and morale reduced absenteeism and the
facilitation of recruitment.

Disadvantages:

It involves federal laws regarding overtime.

It increases the amount of stress on managers and employees, and long workdays can be exhausting.

Flexi time:
Working at flexi hours, permits the employees the option of choosing daily starting and quitting times,
provided that they work a certain number of hours per day or week.

With flexitime , employees are given considerable latitude in scheduling their work.

Flexible working hours are most common in service type organizations like financial institutions,
government agencies or other organizations with large clerical operations.
This provides advantages to both the employers and the employees by allowing greater flexibility in
work scheduling, employers can reduce some of the traditional causes of tardiness and absentiseem

Employees can adjust their work to accommodate their particular lifestyles and in doing so gain greater
job satisfaction.

Employees can also schedule their working hours for the time of day when they are most productive.

Variations in arrival and departure times give more job satisfaction and create more productivity.

Job sharing:
The arrangement where two part time employees perform a job that otherwise would hold by one full
time employee is called JOB SHARING.

Job shares are usually work three days a week “creating an overlap day for extended face to face
conferencing”.

Their pay is three fifths of regular salary however job shares usually take on addition responsibilities
beyond what the original job would required.

Companies that use job sharing are usually in legal, advertising and financial business.

It is more beneficial for people both the husband and wife has to work

If there is an elderly person or a diseased person at home job sharing works better.

Job sharing does have a few problems like

Employers may not want to employ two workers to do work of one because the time required to orient
and train a second employee constitutes an added burden

Telecommuting:
In the year 2010 it is estimated that approximately 25 % of the work force is telecommuting either full
time or part time.

Telecommuting is the use of micro computers, networks and other communications technology such as
fax machines to do work at home which was initially done in workplace.

A variant of telecommunicating the virtual office where employees are in the field selling or servicing or
working at remote locations.