Case Study: Flexible Working - Royal Bank of Scotland

In response to feedback in the annual opinion survey, RBS developed an extensive programme to enable employees to manage their work and personal commitments:

1. Flexible Choice Benefits Scheme – choice of benefits available include childcare vouchers, shopping vouchers, healthcare and pension top ups
2. Flexible Choice Working Policies – comprise of a comprehensive suite of flexible working policies for full and part-time staff, eg, term time working, compressed hours, remote working
3. Flexible Maternity Support – offers information and options to those on maternity leave, such as a maternity information pack, back to work phase back, and a maternity buddy scheme

Senior management are committed to the success of the programme. The CEO reviews the take up of flexible benefits and flexible working options and listens to female employees via regular focus groups. In addition, managers throughout the Group are accountable for ensuring that the policies are embedded in the culture of the organisation, through encouraging employees to take up the options, ensuring all new and replacement roles are advertised as open to flexible working, and supporting employees on maternity leave.

21% of the UK-based workforce works flexibly, of which 91% are female However, as a result of the flexible nature of the RBS employment contract, the company believe that a greater number of employees actually work flexibly but this is not recorded formally. In the 2006 Employee Opinion Survey 80% of employees agreed that their immediate manager allowed them the flexibility they needed for work/life balance and 92% agreed that the working environment was accepting of gender differences.

Female employees said that having to ask if flexible working would be considered was seen as a barrier to progression, so RBS now advertises all internal vacancies as able to be worked flexibly unless specifically stated otherwise by the manager.

In December 2006 around 30% of managers and 21% of senior managers were female, with a number of these working flexibly and acting as role models.

Across the RBS Group the maternity return rate is 81% and in the Corporate Markets Division it is 92%. The organisation is continually reviewing its maternity support, eg, the information pack has been put online to improve accessibility. The Phase Back Policy allows returning mothers to agree a phased return to work while receiving full pay and benefits. The number of employees who elect to have childcare vouchers has risen by 3.54% since 2005.

In addition to regular childcare provisions, in Edinburgh and London the company provides up to 20 free days back-up childcare to help staff when their usual arrangements break down or are unavailable. This has helped to reduce short-term absence which was higher among female staff.