Flexible Working & HR: Promoting Diversity and Inclusion Role

This report analyzes the role of Human Resources in promoting diversity and inclusion through flexible working arrangements within a UK-based retail company employing over 1000 individuals. It discusses how flexible working arrangements, such as telecommuting and flexible schedules, can contribute to both employee well-being and organizational inclusivity. The report evaluates the potential for flexible working to exacerbate existing inequalities, particularly concerning gender roles and career advancement opportunities. Furthermore, it highlights the crucial role of HR in addressing these inequalities by implementing strategies that ensure fair compensation, promote work-life balance, and foster a supportive environment for all employees. The report also touches upon the importance of diversity in the supply chain and leadership within the organization. Desklib offers a platform for students to access similar solved assignments and past papers for their studies.

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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
TASK...............................................................................................................................................3
Flexible Working and Analyse the role of Human Resources in promoting diversity and
inclusion through flexible working:............................................................................................3
Flexible working in relation to inequality at work:.....................................................................5
The role of Human Resources in addressing the concerns of inequality that may arise from
flexible working:.........................................................................................................................6
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
People management refers to the set of several activities which embrace the end to end
methods of talent acquisition, optimization of talent as well as retention of talent at the time of
offering consistent assistance for the organisation and directions for the workers of the company.
In addition to this, the canopy of managing people, is a vital sub set of human resource
management, hence it includes all elements of how people operate, engage, behave and develop
at work. The system employed to manage the people impacts the total operations of the company
and therefore requires to be flexible in accordance to dynamic personal pieces of puzzle with
having the sight of larger image (Janssens, 2021). The following report is based on the retail
company which is situated in United Kingdom. The firm employs more than 1000 employees at
several places. In addition to this, the following report will cover about the flexible working,
evaluation of role of Human Resources in promoting diversity and inclusion through flexible
working. Moreover to this it will include about the flexible working in relation to inequality at
work and the role of Human Resources in addressing the concerns of inequality that may arise
from flexible working.
TASK
Flexible Working and Analyse the role of Human Resources in promoting diversity and
inclusion through flexible working:
Flexible working is known as the several arrangements of working that permits workers
to alter the location, timing and amount of their activity which will lead to the common
advantage of the people and company (Mohamad Hsbollah, Hassan, and Saad, 2020). Flexibility
assist more individuals in order to access the market of labour and engage in the work, managing
life work balance as well as maintaining caring obligations and assist increased engagement of
worker and their well being. Still in several organisations, issues like lack of knowledge and
negative behaviour of the managers towards the flexible operations can restrict being
accomplished for the organisation and people as well. It is essential hence to make the cause the
employers to majorly invest in making more flexible opportunities of working around their staff
and to assist in acquiring people from several experiences and culture.
Moreover to this, flexibility in the workplace is a method by which a company can make
sure that their organisation is inclusive and this has contains a different range of employees from

several cultural backgrounds and with various situations. Possessing a flexible organisation assist
to make sure that the workers of the organisation accomplish a balance among their personal and
professional life. Employees having working family who requires giving time without flexibility
in the work, there can be zero to little time to live their personal life. Hence, organisational
flexibility assist in minimising the stress on the workers and then support them in accomplishing
a balance among their personal and professional life. In addition to it, with the help of flexibility
in the company, employees are appropriately capable to manage their work life balance. The role
of human resource in promoting diversity and inclusion in the workplaces are mentioned below:
The workplace is getting more international. Diversity interpret in gaining edge over the
competitors for the respective company that supports it. It also permits the firm to understand
and leverage various opportunities which are untapped (Baisya, 2021).
 Human Resource promotes diversity – As a technique diversity gives the firm an
option to start understanding the dynamic trends of the consumers. Company can conduct
this with the assistance of their employees of its consumers. As an outcome, this can be
attained in some elements which encourages the employees, minimises the absenteeism
as well as enhances the performance level and everything with the help of making an
inclusive environment and flexibility in the company. In context to the respective
company, role of their human resources in leadership and management which makes the
authorise diverse culture in their company. One who is respectable, inclusive and grants
all the workers the chance to learn, adapt, grow and contribute to the firm.
 Observing diversity – In the retail organisation it can be hard to get an appropriate
thinking of what it is like to have diversity for the company. In order to over come this,
human resource team of the company should observe diversity. As it can be attained by
conducting several audits as well as providing flexibility. Human resource management
of organisation need to do this in their recruitment activities as well as for their existing
workers. As it will permit for more progress to be measured effectually (Palomba, 2018).
 Increasing the pool of talent – At the time when it means to the diversity, human
resource of the retail company should concentrate on constructing a diverse staff with the
help of several practices of recruitment as well as providing flexible training and
development. There are infinite of methods of doing this. Few of this can be done by
external as well as internal partnerships.

 Diversity and mentoring – Just like recruitment, mentoring can also be external or
internal. Human resource management of the firm work with several management
educational organisations which will assist in fostering the talent as well as ensuring
more divers people are conscious of the several opportunities which the company can
provide them (Gobble, 2018).
 Supplying Diversity – Human resource team of the retail company should know that it is
crucial to make sure the diversity of their distribution chain. Moreover to it, this should
reflect the consumer base of the organisation, but also in which that there is the
commercial case for the diversity and flexibility for supply chain.
 Diversity’s growth – This is more clear that human resource of the company has a major
role in the diversity. Organisations should initiate as if they are not evaluating and
implementing flexibility in to the recruitment but human resource need to execute them
more as early as they can. In addition to this, all the optimistic alterations in recruitment,
other elements like diversity and flexibility in supply chain, leadership, progression and
mentoring still requires to be concentrated on to make sure organisations are supporting
ethnic progression of minority in the company.
Flexible working in relation to inequality at work:
At the earlier time, increasing level of inequality in the organisation were usually known
to be the natural side effect of the systematic alteration and development in economy which can
optimistically impact the growth in economy by offering several rewards for creativity,
enhancing investments, saving and entrepreneurship (Nissen, and Dittler, 2019). Hence, that
extreme level of inequality apt to have negative impact on the productivity and sustainability of
the growth in economy which means that higher equality is linked to the brawny and longer
growth level in the economy. It is because with the other elements to the harmful impacts of
inequality on trust, on the betterment of the several teams in the organisations. Moreover to it,
this is also due to the major inequality minimises the share of earning which is dedicated for
gaining that can make the breakdown in the collective need.
The role of Human Resources in addressing the concerns of inequality that may arise from
flexible working:
Role of human resource in conveniently manage the issues of inequality which can occur
from flexible working is mentioned below briefly:

 Enhanced performance - men use and are assumed to utilise the working with
flexibility in order to increase their performance as they focus on increasing aims,
enhance their efforts in work as well as they can also increase their fours of working in
the organisation (JGrzegorczyk, 2021). In addition to this, they are also compensated
more by gained incomes or incentives that can enhance their family and work issues by
the scaling of work in the company. Whereas, women are majorly expected that they
have major responsibilities towards their family at the time when they are functioning
flexibly, that can manage their family work issues but not like men they are not
compensated because of the different expectations in the working.
 More flexible workplaces – Human resource of the company can assist in retaining
many women as well as supports in the gender equality in all the job roles and the pay
level of the women employees by offering them more flexible workplace. In addition to
this, human resource manager must embrace the several opportunities regarding the
working hours of the women employees and many other elements which can help them in
retaining as well as reducing the inequality in the organisation. This will lead to the long
term sustainability as well as success of the retail organisation.
 Telecommuting – It is also called as the remote work or tele work, which includes the
utilisation of the desktop computers as well as several technology of communication in
order to overcome the restraint of location or also the working on the time period (hamb,
and Carlson, 2020). Moreover to this, in the international economy, employees working
from physical place now has been not that crucial than the productivity of the functions.
Remote working might includes the working from home, functioning from the telework
place or from anywhere in the world. Remote work is one of the best suitable for the
employees working in the organisation who needs to work more independently, by
having low face to face interaction, concentration and observation. However,
telecommuting has now globally accepted technique and also the retail company which
also allow it to make metrics in order to track their return on their investment. Telework
usually involves several kinds which are mentioned below:
 Consistent, recurring telework like the worker spending all their working day
or consistently workday schedule, working form home or other place.

 Workers preparing for the spreadsheets or writing the report of the company
from the their remote places on weekends or after working hours and many
more (Sen, 2019).
In order to this the respective firm encounters several issues as telecommuting it can lead to
distraction and because of it sometimes it declines the productivity and performance of the
employees as they miss their deadlines. In addition to this, as employees are not working under
same roof so it impact the communication among the team members which can be the reason for
the errors in accomplishing the goals. Whereas, HR management that offers their workers this
option of telecommuting can assist in lowering the cost of the company, retaining the talented
workers as well as better the health of the employees.
 Schedule Flexibility – It will permits workers a level of liberty in order to make their
own schedules and focus on maintaining their work life balance which supports them in
increasing their productivity. Instead of a traditional, working of morning nine to evening
at five whole week, a flexible schedule permits the workers to function at the time they
want to begin as well as end their work. In addition to this, it offers cost effective as well
as ozone-friendly option. Moreover to this, flexible schedules as it save both money of
the organisation as well as of the workers, it contains the optimistic effect on the
environment as well (Prevost, 2019). Workers having flexible schedules might not have
to attend office on the regular basis. So, the human resource of the company can use this
method in order to address inequality in their organisation and this method also contains
several more flexible options which they can offer to their employees. These options are
mentioned below:
▪ Flexible timing:- flexible timing is basically a form of alternative schedule which
assist the workers of the company in choosing their working hour according to
their freedom. If the HR of the company provide flexible working to their
employees then they can effectively manage their work with their life. This not
only improves their productivity with for the organisation but also help them in
reducing the conflicts which are faced by them with their family members. Under
the flexible timings arrangement the HR management of the company cane offer
different types of flexible employment options to their employees like part time,

flexible start and finish times, compressed hours and remote working. This assist
in that the employees of the company carry out the task with better quality
(Korombel, and Ławińska, 2021).
▪ Compressed work week:- compressed work week is basically an alternative
schedule technique which not only assist the employees of the company to work
less then 5 days in a week but also help them to work 40 hours over a period of 10
days in two weeks. It is very important for the management of the company to
treat all their employees equally i.e. same number of working hour, same number
of holidays and many more. Along with this, the employees whose family status
comprises of child care and elder care responsibilities has to be offered
compressed work week by the management. If the HR of the company offer
compressed work week, then this not only saves the time of the employees but
save their expenses of reporting on regular basis. Along with this, this is also
beneficial for the company as if they convert their entire operations into 4 days in
a week then this saves their cost of utilities and other many overheads.
▪ Job sharing:- job sharing is also known as work sharing which is an employment
arrangement technique in which two or more people are retained on part time
basis in order to carry out the task which is fulfilled by single individual within
their working hour. In this method the HR management of the company divide the
responsibilities on equal basis. So that no high amount of stress has been faced by
them which increases their productivity. If job sharing is offer by the company to
their employees then this enhance the output because the partners are able to share
ideas and skills with each other (Klikauer, 2018).
CONCLUSION
From the above report it has been concluded that, managing people will assist the
respective company to attract the best talent towards the firm. In addition to this, successful
engagement of worker by effectually managing the people processes will give the outcome in

enhanced morale of workers which leads to the enhancement in productivity of the company.
Moreover to this, it has also been concluded that flexible working to diversity and inclusion at
work and also flexible working in context to inequality have given the organisation the major
advantage in gaining more goodwill because as the human resource of the company is more
flexible than the retention of the employees increases so this leads to the firm attaining their long
term goals as well as objectives of the retail company.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Klikauer, T., 2018. Managing People in Organizations. Macmillan International Higher
Education.
Korombel, A. and Ławińska, O., 2021. Building Brand Trust in Managing Relations Between the
Company and the Representatives of Generation Z. Trust, Organizations and the
Digital Economy: Theory and Practice, p.258.
Prevost, L., 2019. A Tech Revolution in Managing Properties. The New York Times, pp.B5-L.
Sen, H., 2019. Managing Information for a Competitive Edge. ITNOW, 61(2), pp.12-13.
Jhamb, S. and Carlson, K.W., 2020. Managing Workplace Ethical Dilemmas, Perceptual Ethical
Leadership, Accountability, and Management Outcomes: A Critical Review and Future
Directions. Journal of Applied Business & Economics, 22(9).
Grzegorczyk, M.A., 2021. Managing Relations in Technology Transfer. In Marketing in
University-Industry Technological Collaboration (pp. 43-68). Palgrave Macmillan,
Cham.
Nissen, V. and Dittler, J., 2019. Measuring and managing the reputation of business
consultancies. In Advances in Consulting Research (pp. 103-131). Springer, Cham.
Gobble, M.M., 2018. Digital strategy and digital transformation. Research-Technology
Management, 61(5), pp.66-71.
Palomba, A., 2018. Managing Media Businesses: A Game Plan to Navigate Disruption and
Uncertainty.
Baisya, R.K., 2021. Managing Start-Ups for Success: Entrepreneurship in Difficult Times.
Routledge India.
Mohamad Hsbollah, H., Hassan, H. and Saad, N., 2020. Managing Business Sustainability in a
Turbulent Environment: A Case of Epic Valley Holdings Sdn. Bhd.
Janssens, J., 2021. Managing and Shaping Change in International Projects. In Research
Anthology on Digital Transformation, Organizational Change, and the Impact of
Remote Work (pp. 1199-1222). IGI Global.