We know, when compared to many of their larger cousins, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) –companies up to 250 employees – are more agile, more flexible and can be more responsive to market changes. They also have a better handle on productivity, as the resources they have at their disposal and what they do with those resources is highly visible. This should make them much more capable of change than large enterprises.
Flexible working provision is crucial
This is usually the case given the way SMEs responded to the pandemic by changing their offering, targeting news markets or quickly conserving resources. Flexible working is one of those areas that Ten2Two has seen embraced by many SMEs. Some form of flexibility – from hybrid working to part-time hours – has quickly become the norm in many companies big and small. Flexible working is now viewed as critical to keeping your best people. And without good people right across the company an SME cannot thrive.
Recent research from Sodexo Engage reveals that 76% of employees are more likely to apply for a role if there is an option to work flexible hours. So it’s key to attracting good people, as well as keeping them. However, the same research also states that of 52% of employees who said they would rather work for a big corporation than a smaller company, 45% said they were put off SMEs due to the lack of flexibility.
So SMEs must not only embrace flexible working to retain their good people. They also have to show they’re doing it to attract great new talent.
Flexible working in SMEs – best practices
With this in mind, the Ten2Two team recently reached out to SME clients they know have fully embraced flexible working in their business culture, policies and working practices. We asked them to reveal their best practices, and we want to share that with you in our new guide to flexible working. We’ve amalgamated their feedback into ‘Compass Briefing: Flexibility in SMEs’. This is a new guide, featuring tips and recommendations across the flexible working cycle. From designing a flexible role to managing a flexible team.
We also asked three specialists and friends of Ten2Two to contribute features on ‘conscious’ flexible management, mental health at work and flexible working requests (an important legal aspect).
This free comprehensive guide is easily downloadable from the Ten2Two website by clicking here.
Take a look. We hope you find it useful. We’d love to hear your thoughts and any ideas that are working for you right now.
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