AIBU to think parents should not “work from home” on Sports Day

[OxfordMum2020]

Some parents are going to WFH from the athletics stands on sports day? Is this normal?

Surely you either take the day off as annual leave/unpaid leave or you don’t attend Sports Day?

So… manage them? This is either acceptable per your company policy. Or it isn’t. It wouldn’t be for mine. We’d be allowed to go to sports day (not for the whole day, but a sports day that lasted a couple of hours) and flex our hours to accommodate.

Yes, it’s difficult to believe isn’t it. Very unprofessional. Ironic really.

Depends how long it is. My youngest was an hour first thing so that day I just started late & worked through lunch.

My eldests was longer, i took a half day AL.

Honestly if I found out my employee was asking for advice on mumsnet on how - or in fact whether! - to enforce an employee policy when I'm paying them to manage someone I'd be more annoyed with that than the person attending sports day.

So stop being a shit manager and actually manage your team

That is not acceptable.

Most people would like to spend more time with their young children.
I worked full time and more when my son was young. To be able to be at work and on the sports fields at the same time doesn't add up.

Well that’s a different situation with your update. It’s not 2 hours out, but a whole day. I would expect holiday if they are unavailable for the whole day.

It depends on the job surely? Some jobs you couldn’t do this, some it probably wouldn’t make much difference and is possibly part of flexibility. I’m happy with my team doing this obviously providing nothing was urgent & nothing in the calendar that couldn’t easily be rearranged with minimal impact, they’d take work phones and be able to answer any pressing issues, they all work hard and it’s about give & take.

So you just say "sorry if you're going to be unavailable all day please book annual leave".

my work absolutely allows this with the expectation that time is made up.

so it depends entirely on your workplace policy.

Can they actually do the job there? Meetings are a very small part of my role, so in theory I could do the rest from anywhere. In practice I can't as I need a decent internet connection, and also large parts of what I do is confidential so shouldn't be done anywhere there's a chance of being overlooked (privacy screens only do so much).

Well then just drop it on them that the answer is no if this isn’t the norm, either manage or accept it.

DP flexed his day to go to our DC's. That was only a couple of hours though: a whole day is ridiculous. I can't work from home, so wouldn't be able to do that either.

Then they don’t get paid.

If you’re nice you could ask if they want to take it as AL or take it unpaid as sick leave.

people at my work would flex their hours and attend sports day. Using leave is silly in our work. We can just work a couple of longer days in the week and make up the time.

no one would complain about not being able to schedule meetings with them for one day for work-life balance purposes. If something was actually critical, the employee would prioritize work.

My employer have in their official policy that the employer to employee relationship is an "adult to adult" one, and if we give sufficient notice, we can arrange our calendars as we choose between 7am-9pm.

Taken to extremes, theoretically two employees working 7h each could work entirely separate hours every day.

But since everyone is an adult, there's almost no piss-taking. In fact, because people are trusted to do the right thing, everyone gets to enjoy the advantages of flexibility without the sort of tedious nitpicking this thread demonstrates that I've seen in other workplaces.

I permanently wfh and would not be even able, never mind allowed, to do this.

An hour or two is one thing, those can be made up.

8.30 to 4 is taking the piss - tell them to book annual leave.

No sports day starts at 8.30am.
If you're the manager you should manage this, not be on here moaning. And in work time too!
I smell a rat.

I’m not sure why some people are hell bent on making life as difficult for others as possible. Surely the problem here is that you have an inflexible job not that other people have flexibility.

You’re looking at it the wrong way round. We should be striving for better working practices for all, not curtailing it due to petty jealousy from those who don’t.

If you’re so upset about people taking 2hrs to cheer for their children then you’ve got your priorities wrong.

Well, if they’re supposed to be working, they should be. But I suppose if they can make the hours up, then no worries.

As their manager why did you not tell them it’s not ok they need to be available for meetings?

The ones who "work from home", but are in the gym and answer business calls, annoy me.

How does this affect you?