Sotomo study: Flexible working hours only a burden for a minority
Published: Monday, Oct 21st 2024, 05:20
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More flexibility in the workplace leads to less stress, not more. This is the astonishing finding of a study conducted by the Sotomo opinion research institute on behalf of the Swiss Employers' Association (SAV).
According to the paper published on Monday, although employees with flexible working hours experience a mix of work and leisure more frequently than those with fixed working hours, only a small proportion of them (26 percent) perceive this mix as stressful.
Overall, people with flexible working hours were even less likely to report stress caused by mixing work and leisure than people with fixed working hours. According to the study, this could be partly due to the fact that flexible working hours made it easier to fulfill social and family obligations, according to the respondents.
Flexible workers less dissatisfied
The results of the study also show that people with flexible working hours are apparently more satisfied with their working time arrangements than those with fixed working hours. The latter are "rather dissatisfied" in 17 percent of cases and "very dissatisfied" in 4 percent.
For employees with flexible working hours, flexibility in consultation with employers or completely flexible working hours, the percentages of those who are somewhat and very dissatisfied are 7, 3 and 2 percent respectively.
Majority want more flexibility
However, according to the Sotomo study, there is a consensus across all these different groups that additional flexibility in working hours would have a positive or rather positive effect on their stress levels. On average, 81 percent of respondents came to this conclusion.
As many as 28% of part-time employees in Switzerland could imagine increasing their workload if they had more flexible working hours. According to the study, this result can probably be explained by the fact that most respondents think that more flexibility would reduce their workload.
Middle-aged people heavily burdened
More than half of employees whose job generally allows flexible working hours would like more flexible working time models than flexitime, the paper continues. This desire is particularly noticeable among middle-aged people (36 to 50-year-olds), who are heavily burdened with childcare responsibilities, among other things.
People with fixed working hours also complained in 28% of cases that their working hours were rather difficult or difficult to reconcile with family and social obligations. In the groups with more flexible working models, 8, 6 and 3 percent respectively expressed the same unease.
Employers' association feels vindicated
The SAV sees these results as confirmation of its call for more flexible working time models, as it writes in an accompanying communiqué. They could make an important contribution to combating the increasingly acute labor shortage.
The findings of the study also clearly contradict the thesis often put forward by trade unions that flexible working hours inevitably lead to a stressful mix of work and leisure time.
Basically, satisfaction is high
All in all, however, it is also important to mention what is listed first among the most important results of the Sotomo study: The vast majority of the working population in Switzerland is satisfied with their working time models (89 percent very or fairly satisfied) and their compatibility with their social and family life (rated as good or fairly good by 86 percent).
According to the study, this basic satisfaction is shared by all sections of the population and applies to women and men as well as people with an apprenticeship or university degree.
1670 people surveyed
According to Sotomo, the results of this study are representative of the working population aged between 18 and 65 living in German-speaking and French-speaking Switzerland. It was conducted between March 15 and April 3, 2024 and surveyed 1670 people.
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