After months of anticipation and speculation, the University has released its updated Flexible and Hybrid Work Guidelines and we can discuss concretely what they say.
For many of us, the outcome—one or two days working at home each week—won’t change. It might change for you, however, if you’ve been working outside of the old guidelines (i.e. more than two days at home), or based on the decisions of your manager or Executive Council member.
We recognize that this might be a significant adjustment for some of you and have ripple effects throughout your life. We ask all staff—and all members of our campus community—to be supportive of one another over the next few months as this rolls out.
We shared staff perspectives on what an ideal hybrid work approach could look like in our recent Hybrid and Flexible Work Survey report. Today, we're focusing on the University's guidelines, which were sent to all staff yesterday, and what they mean for you.
The guidelines
We encourage everyone to read the guidelines and supporting documentation in full, but here’s a quick summary:
Hybrid work
This part is an updated version of the old guideline and processes. The basics remain the same: if approved, employees can arrange to work up to two days a week at home on an ongoing basis, for up to one year.
- By default, everyone is expected to work five days a week on campus.
- Everyone has the right to apply for one or two days a week from home. You’ll do this through Workday. You can apply for more than two, but this will face additional review; we expect approval for this to be rare.
- Your manager will need to support your application with some documentation, and then your Executive Council member has to approve it.
- You must be provided with a clear rationale if either your manager or your EC member denies the application.
- Nothing in the guidelines supersedes formal accommodations.
Note that, if guidelines and accommodations are applied equitably, some staff will—rightly—have more at-home days than others. We ask everyone to respect and support fellow staff members and their unique needs.
Flexible work
This part of the guidelines enhances the ability for staff to work from home on a short-term basis as needed, for a wide variety of reasons, from medical or home repair appointments to specific work projects that need a distraction-free environment.
- “Flexibility” refers to both location and hours.
- These are informal arrangements between you and your manager with no documentation required.
- Using the flexibility guidelines to work remotely is separate from a regular hybrid schedule.
- For example, if you normally work from home on Wednesdays and Thursdays, and you stay home due to a family emergency on Monday, you still work from home that Wednesday and Thursday.
- “Short-term” is open to interpretation; it is not limited to just one or two days at a time (but it also can’t be used to replace a regular hybrid arrangement).
Again, we encourage you to read through everything—we shared questions we’ve heard (or anticipated) from staff, and many of these are answered in the FAQ or other supporting documentation.
If you have additional questions or concerns, please share them with your manager or Executive Council member. You can also drop questions in our suggestion box or send them to your Area Representative to bring to us; we’ll pass them on to admin, but remember that decisions are ultimately up to your manager and EC member.
The impact of your feedback
The UWSA was not part of any formal approval process for these guidelines, but we did share staff perspectives with decision makers. We made sure the University heard, backed by our survey results, how important hybrid and flexible work are to staff members. We see some of this feedback reflected in the final version of the guidelines and the communication about them: Hybrid work is still on the table, flexibility has been prioritized, and managers are receiving trainingon the value and importance of flexibility. We’re hopeful this training will help ensure the guidelines are applied fairly and consistently.
Based on input from members, we particularly gave feedback about how hybrid work intersects with staff wellbeing and the need for equity over a one-size-fits-all approach, and we do see this incorporated throughout the university’s messaging. It will be up to managers and Executive Council members to ensure that this is reflected in practice.
We know that staff wellbeing and satisfaction directly affect productivity—as well as being important in and of themselves—and we hope to see these factors adequately considered in decision making about both hybrid and flexible arrangements.
What happens next—for you
You should know by now if your unit has a group-level arrangement for one or two days at home and what the details of that will be; if it does, you do not need to apply for an individual arrangement.
If your role isn’t covered by a group hybrid work plan, you can apply for an individual one at any time through Workday. Ideally, you’ll start with a conversation with your manager and work together to make the case for how remote days will benefit your work.
We’re not sure how long the approval process will take right now—it will depend on the volume of requests in a given unit—but you’ll likely get a final decision within a few weeks.
What happens next—for us
The UWSA has a very clear role in developing and approving policies that affect staff working conditions, through a collaborative, collegial process with the administration. Such a process has not been created for guidelines, but it’s clear that members want to see a similar approach applied to all rules affecting staff working conditions. We have raised with administration the need to discuss the differences between policies and guidelines, and what should be covered in each.
The University has made commitments to considering stakeholder perspectives, to a healthy workplace, and to supporting the physical and mental health of staff. We will continue collecting and sharing staff input as this rolls out to ensure that your perspectives and wellbeing remain a focus in this and other conversations at the University.
A brief FAQ
The University has an extensive FAQ page that we strongly recommend reading if you have questions. We’ll address just a couple of very specific things we want to draw attention to.
What if I can’t change my childcare arrangements in time for January 1?
Current hybrid and flexible work arrangements allow some staff members to manage school drop-off and pick-up for children who are old enough to be at home without active care or supervision, but who can’t be at home or get to and from school on their own. Some before- and after-school care programs need to be booked for the full school year before September. Managers are being encouraged to allow flexibility in these cases to allow for a short adjustment period.
What if I have a formal accommodation?
This guideline does not affect formal accommodations, including those allowing for hybrid or flexible work.
What if I think I need a formal accommodation?
If you have been making use of informal accommodations (for example, your manager has been fine with you working from home more often), you may want to consider whether you will require a formal accommodation, or if the guidelines will provide what you need. You don’t need to decide this right away—you could apply for one or two days a week at home now, talk to your doctor or other healthcare practitioner, and start figuring out, for example, how different schedules affect you to determine what you need. Employee Health and Accommodations is there to help you with the accommodation process.
We recognize that getting a formal diagnosis for some conditions that affect your experience working in a shared environment can take years, can be cost-prohibitive, and can come with stigma and other drawbacks—this is why a flexible, universal design approach to work would be ideal. But a formal diagnosis is not always necessary for accommodations. Your healthcare practitioners will help you provide documentation about your needs and functional limitations, which is what really matters.