Flexibility and insecurity

By Mrs Hilton

Starter

• http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/dealing-with-customers/4853.html

• Watch video from BBC about work life balance.

• Discussion after what do they group think it means?

Flexibility is an important aim in business – why?

1. Modern marketplace is changing constantly and businesses must be position to respond quickly to changes

Flexibility is an important aim in business – why?

2. Consumers are more likely to demand personal attention and customised products.

Firms must change their operations to meet differences in demand.

Or what?

“Any customer can have a car painted any colour that he wants so long as it is black”

Remark about the Model T in 1909, published in his autobiography My Life and Work (1922) Henry FordIs this still true of Ford today?

The new Ford Mondeo.What colour would you pick?

Flexibility is an important aim in business – why?

• Competitive pressures force firms to look for flexibility in seasonal production

Successful business have the ability to transform themselves

Flexible specialisation

• In order to meet demands of a changing marketplace and pressures on companies, firms aim to achieve flexible specialisation– Rapid reprogramming of machinery– Production batches of similar items– Multi-skilled workforce that can adapt quickly to

changing demands

Rapid reprogramming

• Greenhouse heating, light and watering automatic functions

• Can be rapidly reprogrammed for different crops.

Multi-skilled workforce

• Builders that can:– Drill– Paint– Plaster– Repair– Use wood– Use metal– Do electrics

Until 1990’sItems were mass produced, e.g. Lady Diana’s weddingDress was reproduced in its millions.

Customers had to buy what was available

Now you can have a wedding dress made to your own design

Now customers dictate what manufacturers should produce.

How firms achieve flexibility

• Flexible working

• Flexible structures

• Flexible operations

Flexible working 1• 'Flexible working' is a phrase that describes any working pattern

adapted to suit your needs. Common types of flexible working are:• part-time: working less than the normal hours, perhaps by working

fewer days per week • flexi-time: choosing when to work (there's usually a core period

during which you have to work) • annualised hours: your hours are worked out over a year (often set

shifts with you deciding when to work the other hours) • compressed hours: working your agreed hours over fewer days • staggered hours: different starting, break and finishing times for

employees in the same workplace • job sharing: sharing a job designed for one person with someone

else • home working: working from home

How did flexible working come about?

• Over the last part of the twentieth century, the relationship between work, family and leisure has altered significantly.

• From the 1970s onwards, large numbers of women entered the workforce for the first time, most taking up part-time work to fit around family commitments.

• The success of this has prompted the gradual acceptance by employers of the need for more family-friendly work practices. It is increasingly apparent that this allows them access to a more flexible workforce.

Work – life balance• As work has become less central to

people’s lives, vying for time with family and leisure, many have become concerned with what is termed the ‘work-life balance’.

• ‘Work-life balance is about people having a measure of control over when, where and how they work. It is achieved when an individual's right to a fulfilled life inside and outside paid work is accepted and respected as the norm, to the mutual benefit of the individual, business and society’

Training the workforce

• Firms can change direction and make new plans if they have a workforce that has a variety of skills.

• They can cover for colleagues to keep production going.

Puerto Rico is capitalizing the resources- expertise and talent from the companies and a

highly trained workforce - in order to achieve an innovative approach to economic development.

Changing work culture

• Additional training can mean greater job loyalty. Job enrichment is a motivator and reorganising work to give employees greater responsibility.

• Factors can produce a workforce culture committed to the aims of the forms and willing to change.

Flexible business structures• Core• Forms basis for all

operations• Full-time staff

• Periphery• All other tasks needed

to run the firm• Not central to the

business• Part-time staff

Charles Handy’s Shamrock Organisation (1989)

Flexible operations• Contract out work• Outsourcing

• For example marketing research companies may be brought in.

• It’s time consuming specialist work, perfect for a company specialising in research.

Flexible operations

• Downsizing• Reducing size of firm in

effort to make it more responsive to market place

• Mainly aimed at reducing office functions

• Tasks contracted out rather than having to hire and fire.

Insecurity

• Problems to workers• Redundancy• Constant training• Lack of job security

Opportunities for workers

• New challenges• Increased self-reliance• Diverse career paths• Learning new skills

Things to make you go hmmm• Can argue that more flexibility is the result not of

planned strategy but of the 1990 recession.• Many forms forced to cut costs but remain

profitable• Downsizing and outsourcing attacks the largest

cost – labour• When minimum costs and operations have been

developed what scope is there for future development of the business.

• Now try the revision questions....

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