• A first step is to determine your own vision of flexibility. While this will vary from one organisation to another, there should be some similarities. The key is to develop a process that will enable you to design the options that best suit your workplace;
• It is worth noting that most organisations have not implemented flexibility with the intention of enabling employment outcomes for women. Indeed, many of the flexibility options provided, for example, can operate to limit workplace opportunities for women; and
• Unless careers are redesigned and traditional assumptions about career pathways challenged, flexible work options present limited opportunities to enable improved employment outcomes for women.

Based on our knowledge from other organisations, it would be expected that flexibility options should cover:

When work is conducted:

• Flexibility in starting and finishing times;
• Working a compressed week (eg. four ten-hour days);
• Annualised hours; and
• Variations in weeks of work across the year (eg. part-year employment).

Where work is conducted including options such as:

• Combining office and home-based work;
• Home based work; and
• Working in a range of different locations.

How work is conducted:

• A key factor is the level of control a person has over the day-to-day decisions about structuring tasks, decisions and workplace demands.

Job structure including the following options:

• Part-time work; and
• Job sharing.

Career options that include:

• Career breaks;
• Redesigning career pathways; and
• Redesigning management positions.

Tips:

• Have managers redesign their own jobs using the work by design tool; and
• Adopt an inclusive approach by focusing on identifying the major barriers to job effectiveness.