If you work for the civil service and are hybrid working ...

[bringandbought]

... how much flexibility do you have and do you think it will last?

I currently have a very secure job with a university, in IT. It is hybrid, so meant to be 2 days in the office, but my manager is very flexible, so I'm rarely in more than 1 day a week, and often not at all if there are transport/weather issues or I'm feeling below par, or have a valid domestic reason like a school strike or plumber visiting. How much of this flexibility will I lose if I move to a civil service job? Is flexibility manager-dependent, or does Jacob Rees Mogg's influence spread far and wide? And do you think there is a risk that hybrid working will end altogether at some point? (The job I'm applying for has a market supplement attached, so I'm tempted, but I'd feel very aggrieved if hybrid working evaporated in future).

I'd say it depends on management of that area rather than there being one specific culture.

I'd definitely apply then can raise at interview.

I'm not employed by CS but related field and we can pick and choose what we do. I do 2 days in the office officially but that's very much my choice and people often don't come in due to childcare, rail strike etc etc. So we're very flexible and I think a lot of offices now have more staff than desks so you couldn't go in 5 days anyway.

I work for the civil service. We have to be in the office 40% of the week. I think it's moving in the direction of 60%. I don't think it'll become 100% but there's definitely a move away from home working and some meetings are compulsory to attend in person even if in different cities. I hated wfh so am happy.

HMRC; we have 60% in the office over 4 weeks so there's extra flexibility. Built into the contract now so not changing anytime soon.

If you ensure any hybrid arrangements are in your contract, then you would be ok.

Depends on your department and your direct management. We have to be in 40% in mine, but also have weeks where we’re called to be in every day at quite short notice due to the type of work we do. My manager is quite chill so long as you let her know what you’re doing (I work 3 days a week and only go in 1 day, nobody seems to have noticed this equates to 33% and not 40%)

I’ve heard from others DfE are starting to get quite strict about office attendance

Technically civil service and we are expected in at a mimimum for one day a week which I usually do (have missed the odd week with no issue). Some people do more days in the office, some people do less and at the moment this is fine. My manager is also super flexible if you have a domestic/childcare etc reason to stay at home on particular days.However from the comments coming from senior management lately I'm expecting the one day a week to become mandatory soon but I can't imagine hybrid working ever disappearing (it was normal for us to wfh 1/2 days a week even pre pandemic).

It completely depends on which department, the individual part of the department, your actual team and your manager. For example, I work for MOD and am only required to go to the office once a fortnight for a team meeting. But I know people in other areas of MOD have to come in more often, whilst others in MOD only have to come in once every three months or so! In other government departments I know some people who have to go in 40% but others who only go in an handful of times a year. So there is no one size fits all for the civil service. You’ll need to ask the recruiting manager to find out the situation for the role you’re interested in.

HMRC here, and 40% in the office is in our contract so I'm not worried about losing it. Very flexible, but there is the attempt to coordinate so that most people in the team are in one day together. This isn't compulsory though

I’m in the DWP - not customer facing and we’re 40% office based (so 2 days a week for me) but my job could easily be done 100% from home. Whilst my line manager is super flexible and so long as I’m not taking the ps I can move those days around or WFH on one of my office based days if I need to, rumour has it that the ‘big boss’ wants us to be more office based (she’s a ‘people’ person who thinks we work better face to face - not true in my case) but I’m not sure where she would stand on that front (I don’t think the 40% thing is written into our contract though so I suspect she could push for more if she wanted).

DH's department has always been incredibly flexible and he doesn't see that changing.

What they have been told though is that within two years of whatever point they were given the notification (I can't recall) anyone receiving London allowance but who has been working remotely instigated by COVID would have to be in at least 50% to retain the allowance.

As a hard nosed private sector employee, I nearly fell of my chair that they're being given two years to get to 50% of the days in London. We'd be lucky to get three months notice but then again, we don't even get a London allowance.

My husband is CS and is hybrid working. He tends to have to go to the office about twice a month. Sometimes it’s less than that, sometimes more but over the year it averages out to around twice a month.

anyone receiving London allowance but who has been working remotely instigated by COVID would have to be in at least 50% to retain the allowance.

Yuck. Which department is that @CSWife ? I'm in London, so it's potentially relevant.

It seems very unreasonable, because transport is one component of the cost of living in London.

I think it greatly varies between departments. I'm CPS and only have to go in about once a month, but colleagues with other roles have to go in more. But there's some interesting stuff on the union (PCS) website

This highlights how it really does depend on the team.

I'm also MOD and our direction is 40% of time to be in office. I'm not based on the same site as most of the team so am not being queried too much if I only do 1 day.

No one complains if someone stays home with the a cold though, keep the germs out of the office.

How is it unreasonable? Surely if you're receiving additional income to live or travel to London then you really should, um, do that!

Which part of MOD is that @Alm1986 ?

I do live in London.

My job is in civil service. Ours is 1 day compulsory a week at the moment (each area has a different day) they are supposed to be upping it to 2 days per week. Given they gave us zero pay rise, yes ZERO! I don't think they want to rock the boat just now. Im part time, I don't go in at all as the day my team goes in is one of my non working days.

I know others that go in 3/4 times a week (either coz they want to or mgr is putting pressure on) and others that go in once every few weeks or once a month which must be at managers discretion. It depends on the job and your manager.

I have a lot of flexibility. I can nip out for school things and make the time up later. I use my lunch break to pick to pick my eldest up from school and then I have her with me for last couple of hrs until I finish. I can finish early/late and same with start time as I have flexi. Can build up days off. I work 3 days per week and last few years I've worked enough flexi to get almost another 2 weeks off (so 5/6 days for me).

It's also flexible if u can't make it in to office that week for a valid reason.

It won't end for us we are moving office buildings this year and have taken a much smaller building (about 50% less) that won't fit us all in and we are also sub letting it out to other government bodies so we def can't all go back. They also told us way back in 2020 that it would be hybrid permanently.

The difficulty is what a department officially does is often different from the reality but you can't always be sure! Can also depend on the team, manager and grade.

My current department is 2-3 days a week but I'm getting away with 1 day a week. I'm in the process of transferring and my new department whilst officially 2-3 will accept once a week, but they have said I can do every other week but this is an informal arrangement that is not guaranteed. I inherited a member of staff who lives over 200 miles from his office, so he obviously rarely goes in. I've taken a risk moving to a department further away (I can get in quite easily currently I just choose not to) but I suppose if you don't try you won't know and this is a good career step.

It varies enormously across the civil service, even within departments.

Broadly, there is a big push to appease JRM and increase time spent in the office. As a result of this, you often see jobs advertised as based “nationally”, but also “hybrid”, which doesn’t make a lot of sense. How can you be based anywhere “nationally”, but then also be available for hybrid working wherever the office is.

Most of the time, it’s a case of having to arrange a chat with the hiring manager to gauge location needs before applying.

I work for an exec agency / aleo so one step removed from CS, but we’re very flexible. Some people are in every day and some once a fortnight; some people are in even less than that.

I know of some small teams who require specific days for office presence (team meetings usually) but it’s very variable. The nature of our work involves a lot of travel across the country so that also changes things - for a pure desk job I imagine there would be more of a set 2-3 days per week in the office required.

Don’t pay much attention to Jacob Rees-Moggs soundbite pronouncements, he was the minister responsible for the Cabinet Office and many of his ‘criticisms’ of the wider Civil Service were specific to the Cabinet Office.

Unconcious bias courses were announced to be scrapped months after they had been already dropped across government and treated within equality & diversity, the weird and wonderful training courses he ‘identified’ were mostly just a fancy name for good content (if you read past the buzz word and looked at the content)
The ‘woke’ equality and diversity, discrimination, Health and safety training etc that he criticised the civil service for are mandatory training required of all large businesses by law from his government.

He left his ‘Brexit & government efficiency’ post after 8 months with no apparent impact going to BEIS for 2 months

There is nothing that I have seen that came of any of his announcements - a soundbite was put out to the media and then he went quiet for a while until he came up with a new soundbite.

He complained that because he was making cabinet office staff work over hours at the start of the week that they took time off at the end of the week - it’s almost as if they worked the hours of their employment contracts, and when he left sarcastic ‘while you were out’ notes it was pointed out that he wasn’t working a ministers hours and not taking his briefs.

….. after that rant …..

I’m with MoD Army, and work on a hybrid basis with no specific in/out of office pattern.

In my team we deal with people across the country, and of those based on our office floorplate have ad hoc requirements so don’t have a general rhythm to be together.

When people are in we aren’t bound to our desks so also end up communicating via Teams with the person who was across the room an hour earlier

I go in periodically for specific reasons for what I’m doing or if I can arrange to see specific people

I didn’t go in last week and don’t plan to this week, but I was in for most of the previous two weeks
(One day it turned out that I was the only person their for an hour, with ultimately only 3 of us in that day all working alone)

Others have set targets such as two days in, which they either time together as a team or do any 2 days to suit the individual

We haven’t set specifics but each team did put together their ‘hybrid plans’
Ours is very fluffy as a set plan would just have been being in for the sake of being in.

Pre COVID I spent much of my time walking around buildings to see specific people or face to face meetings, and back to desk for a remote meeting. COVID working and hybrid working have changed that into choosing the most appropriate ways of doing anything

I'm in HOCS but i think it is driven by our 2*. The business area I support doesn't seem to implement it.