Precariousness and unemployment they are the most important problems
of the Spanish labor market?
Yes, they are very important problems,
but the lack of time for reconcile employment and personal life
It is also a big problem.
In 2018, in the European Union, the Spaniards are the least satisfied
with balance between employment and personal life,
according to the Eurobarometer.
In Spain, in the last two decades,
the number of children has increased who lives in a single parent home,
or in a home in which mother and father, both, have a job.
In total, 70% of minors lives with people
who need to reconcile the working time with the family member.
To ensure child welfare,
the families they do not just need income,
but also time for parenting.
The employment conciliation and family is a women's thing?
Yes, women are those that best adapt their employment
to family needs, but men are changing.
The men are incorporating, increasingly,
to childcare,
By will, by necessity and by law.
Society goes towards a co-responsible conciliation,
that is to say, mothers and fathers, work and care.
For example, since 2014,
men use, increasingly, the paternity leave.
In such a way that, in 2017,
for every 100 births, 68 men used this permission.
Companies can encourage the co-responsible conciliation,
as the IMPLICA project shows.
-The project IMPLICA has an innovative perspective
about conciliation of employment and personal life.
It is usually analyzed conciliation for women,
we wanted to analyze conciliation for men,
specific, for parents under 12 years old.
-The study has been possible thanks to the help
of different stamps of equality and conciliation
in different parts of Spain.
From these stamps 11 SMEs were selected,
small and medium businesses, and in each SME they interviewed ...
to the people responsible of human resources and, in addition,
they interviewed two parents who worked in those companies
and that they had taken refuge ...
to some of the measures of co-responsible conciliation,
available in them.
-We have chosen companies in four sectors:
of the industry, of services to people,
of services IT companies
and services of consulting and management.
The men Do not want to care and not reconcile?
It depends, men prefer the conciliation measures
that do not reduce your income.
According to the survey of active population,
26% of mothers are welcomed the hourly reduction
by legal guardian for the care of a minor,
while only 4% of parents did.
The gap of gender is even greater
in the use of a unpaid leave
To leave temporarily employment,
measure to which they are welcomed almost exclusively mothers
11% compared to 0.7% of parents.
The differences between men and women are small
when the measures of conciliation does not reduce income,
as is the case of the use of maternity and paternity leave,
in time flexibility or in regular teleworking.
For every 100 women who received a maternity benefit,
there were 90 men who received a paternity benefit.
According to the survey of employment of time,
14% of mothers and 10% of parents
they enjoy of a continuous day
Within the group of employees with minors under their care.
The representative surveys they also show us that ...
there is hardly a gender gap in the use of flexible hours,
because 50% of women use it, compared to 46% of men.
Even regular teleworking does not show any gender gap,
although it draws attention the scarce use that is made of it,
only 3.5% of the people employed
they say telework regularly.
The permits of maternity and paternity
are paid for social security.
What is the cost? the absence of a father
during the permit of paternity for the company?
-Well then... depend on the posts,
in Conento we replace ...
to parents or mothers for motherhood or fatherhood.
There are positions that We can not substitute, truthfully,
because the expertis that require and the involvement in the projects
it's very difficult hire someone, in addition,
is that it is impossible, practically, for one month or four months.
So, the cost for Conento, Well, if it's not replaced ...
the cost of social security, obviously, we assume it
and, well, with joy, in the sense that dad
is having his paternity leave is like that.
And the work is reorganized otherwise to replace him,
if it is a position that you can not hire
to a person to replace.
A little economic, for the social security part
that you have to continue coasting from the company, obviously,
and organizational
The good thing is that as they are absences that are already foreseen,
that we already have the planned date, well that helps us organize
the entrance and exit of that person's project,
focusing to the period in which you will have
its low of maternity or paternity.
An organizational alternative:
Contract to replace a person of maternity leave.
-Well, nothing, doing maternity substitutions.
We like to select people, well ...
one of the compañeras he entered doing internships,
started with an internship contract with an agreement with the institute,
an Administration FP2, and we have been forming it and so on,
and when the partner the maternity leave has been taken,
it has been this the person who replaced it ...
and, probably, stay with us when the partner joins,
because it works pretty good
-And paternity leave,
I'm enjoying now, now, of him,
once it has finished the period of my wife.
My wife has had 16 weeks
and, now, I have started, once she has finished it.
Now, currently, in my work, There is a person replacing me,
then, there it will be ...
Well, when we start to work, as I said before,
my wife will work in the morning,
I will be in charge of him all morning ...
lift him, feed him, be with him, play with him, walk with him ...
and once that my wife came home,
eat together, and I go to work in the afternoon,
and my wife will be the one take care of him in the afternoon,
for later to the night then already ... dine together, I hope, and the bed.
In companies with work shifts
Is conciliation impossible?
In the project IMPLICA,
companies have been studied with direct attention to people
and work with fixed shifts.
In some company the shift is assigned according to seniority in the company,
without regard to the needs of conciliation.
In others, the aim is to adapt shifts to family needs,
through the shift change
and horizontal mobility between posts of the same category.
-From the company they allow me to change the shift
and, even, the workplace.
There is a section in the company which is called "horizontal mobility",
in which you can ask, without apparent excuse, or with excuse,
you can ask the change of position so that ...
fit more to your needs.
The companies They have to offer their customers
a service 24 hours a day and seven days a week?
Not always.
There are sectors where you can compact work days
to facilitate conciliation without harm customer service.
-Schedule it was practically impossible ...
because it was a split day, from 9:00 to 14:00 and from 16:00 to 19:00,
we lived far of the work center,
more transport public, more like ... and it was ...
impossible conciliate minimally ...
with a family life or personal was very complicated,
except for the purposes of the week, obviously.
-Madrid It was a very big city,
we had some jobs 30 kilometers from where we lived,
in Alcalá de Henares,
and we went out at 7:00 in the morning from home ...
and we did not come back until 9:30 p.m.
With two children that we already had, then they were not even two years old,
we practically did not live with them, they did not live with us,
They were with grandparents all day,
and we did not consider it to be the life that we wanted to have with them,
we did not consider motherhood nor fatherhood in that way.
Yes, well, we ...
in summer we had already the hours from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
because here in Écija ...
from 3:00 p.m. in the afternoon everything is dead
until 9:00 p.m. because of the heat and so on,
and ... until after the fair, which is in mid-September,
we did not return with the split schedule.
And one year we decided to continue with the hours of 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
and try to see what happened,
we communicate it to the customers via email,
we commented that it was going to be for theme of family conciliation and ...
because practically in the afternoon there was no movement
and, also, well ... the same work is done in seven hours,
that we are from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.,
that before we were from 9:00 to 14:00 and from 17:00 to 19:00,
at the end they are the same hours, but more compact.
Then, in the end, the performance is the same.
Everyone congratulated us, everyone understood it,
there were people who said: "Oh, I wish I could too",
but of course, this company, this sector,
yes you can afford the luxury of having that schedule,
but there are sectors that do not, for example, a trade.
A trade can not open only from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., for example,
because there will be people who just can go to buy in the afternoon
and you can not have a closed shop in the afternoon.
-We organize, basically, having a schedule from 8:00 to 15:30,
and one day a week we work until 18:00,
we always try that all the Evenings a technician is in the office,
to be able to give support to our clients,
since we we offer the service
from 8:00 in the morning at 18:00 in the afternoon.
Then, in this way, we always try to organize ourselves
so that, in the afternoon, there is a technician in the office
and be able to give all the service that we offer to the client.
With regard to customers,
in our case he did not this change needs to be explained,
because we kept doing customer service hours,
the same as we did previously, then,
there was no need to explain this step of changing hours
because, in the end, they had service until 18:00 in the afternoon.
What is true, that more and more we try
accustom customers to have a normal work schedule,
that is, do not call me at 20:00 in the afternoon because,
Even before, I was not going to catch you the phone at 20:00 in the afternoon.
Then, it is important too the awareness of people
up to what point you can or can not, call ...
Well, in your case, to your provider or the office ...
that is, every time we try to make clear
that we have a schedule from 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.,
and that past that schedule ... tomorrow will be another day,
although it is very difficult ...
That the clients... end up giving up,
what is it worth? Well this is the schedule,
Because we have customers from many cities
and there are cities in which the working hours
It can be lengthened 20:00 in the afternoon ... or more,
so, This is not our case.
-Conento is a consultant,
as such the schedule is one of our challenges, that's a fact,
in the sense that it is a company that serves customers
and, the old schedule, that we had until two years ago,
It was the usual, and it was from 9:00 to 13:30 and from 15:00 to 18:30,
OK?, It was the usual schedule.
So, it was a schedule that It meant eating in an hour and a half,
when there were people who prefer eat in a shorter period
and be able to leave before, the summary is that.
So, we did a year and a half ago,
a strong bet to improve conditions,
of doing a radical change of this.
Then, we think a little out of the box,
which our CEO likes it a lot,
enter this type of lateral thinking for ...
solve or improve the life of our team,
and we think why do not we do a constant semi-intensive day?
that is, that we can eat only in half an hour,
that we can enter at 8:00.
So the schedule it is currently the following,
we can enter a range Free and flexible from 8:00 to 9:30,
also in case one day you have a management in a bank, a doctor ...
well simply you enter later that day,
and then you can choose to eat from half an hour to two hours,
because there are also people that because they live nearby or family,
they prefer to go and return at a given moment at noon,
but, in principle, you can choose eat from half an hour to two hours.
So the schedule semi-intensive or compact
that we can do is from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.,
which is a schedule for a very innovative consultancy.
Well, after Fridays We always do from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
and in summer we do always intensive day,
from July and August from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
And, now, in June 2018, we have introduced another novelty,
that was a proposal to the team,
and our surprise has been that 100% of the team has chosen it,
and has been doing two weeks a month of four days,
that is to say, We have two weeks a month,
so that organizing work in another way,
working hours in another way,
doing a little more 30 minutes more per day
or two hours and 20 more minutes a week,
we leave Two free Fridays per month.
So, it's being very attractive this part too.
This is one of the challenges And why not say so,
one of the fears that as a company you had,
how this was going to take place.
Yes it is true that always these things give a bit of vertigo,
but then with good will,
with common sense, with good judgment, it is done,
It's a little ... educate a little, too,
to the rest of ... surroundings, clients ...
with that a little bit the schedule we have is that,
but it is certain that if a client ...
It puts us a meeting after hours,
there is no other way to solve it,
well the team that leads to that client comes that day and that's it,
everything is understood as something that has to be attended to
and it's our priority, that too,
but the norm, as usual, is that people make their schedule
and leave at the time they have chosen.
Actually, it was a my proposal relatively,
here, the truth, is that these decisions
they are taken very organically,
also with our CEO who, as always,
He leads a lot this kind of things,
that is, they are not issues that I have to sell or convince,
but it really is something very of all, in this sense.
So, Well, the truth is that ...
I already told you before, than the start cost,
there is always true vertigo before the novelty
for the service to the clients,
but then it is solved with good will and common sense,
the truth is that it's going to be solved very well,
the template is very happy, it is bringing us enough revenues,
while retaining talent, which is difficult in this sector,
when I do interviews, I'll take care of the part
of talent recruitment, of new candidates,
It is very attractive the four-day weeks,
the flexibility of the schedule ... In short, those are issues that,
today, in the labor market that we are and that ...
in these kinds of professions of the sector in which we move,
technological, which are highly demanded profiles and such,
or do you something different or, really ...
And I think that the fact of being able to square
your personal life and family with work,
even in a job ... Well, you like it a lot,
and that is challenging and demanding, because it's a difficult job,
but ... can do it,
and be a person who can get to interesting positions ...
and having his family, Well, I think it's attractive.
Time flexibility
It is based on trust and in the work for tasks.
-Mainly, TBS, from its beginnings,
his philosophy is trust in the worker,
and we have not never posed the putting ...
for the worker to sign
or for control to be done of the hours of entry and exit,
We have never done this.
So, it's full trust with the worker,
if the worker knows that has a flexible schedule
and has a time compaction,
if you enter at 8:00
and has flexibility to enter until 9:00,
Then he knows he has to leave an hour later.
So, there's no a control over this process.
In our case, all workers,
even when we do job interviews,
We always say the same thing:
"Hey, it's that we do not have a transfer system "
and that, basically, we base in trust in the worker
and in the responsibility of each
to know when it has to finish or not, a job.
So, We always organize ourselves like that.
In Spain, Do you trust teleworking?
No, it's the measure that less is used,
even in technology companies.
In several companies studied by IMPLICA,
yes it is offered regular teleworking,
that facilitates partially the conciliation.
-For a long time I work Fridays from home,
because I live outside Barcelona,
with which to go to Barcelona every day always ... and by car,
because I have to get to certain hour home, it's an important time,
and all that saves me ... It's good, Friday, especially,
that after you have the end already to do more things.
Teleworking was offered to me,
I had worked a while from an even more distant city
and had been some days from home,
and from there I saw that it was comfortable for me.
With which, when returning to be close to the company,
I already did the whole day again ... from Monday to Friday at the company,
but, with my boss we talked about what would be good ...
to improve my conditions, and we talked about Friday ...
there was the possibility of not working in the company
and so save me all that car time,
that always It gives a little trouble.
With my son, Teleworking itself ...
it was nothing that was an advantage because ...
in the end, I'm working at home.
Yes, in some moments that the child has been sick
or have we had some problem in that ...
maybe he had that someone is coming, but ...
could not arrive until a certain time,
yes it was good for me to be this day at home, to be with the child,
but in the end, you are working during this day,
with which, either You can be for other things.
And yes I do not have the time
what do you have to go home after work,
that already gives you a margin of one time to do what is necessary.
-We agreed ... because the company is ours,
we have created it and others, then the subject of schedules
and the issue of conciliation we handle it.
In the sense that I I work almost always from home,
and from home I'm doing things of the house while I work ...
I'm preparing the food, I'm ordering the house a bit ...
and that's it, when they arrive from school,
well they have good part of the work done.
And already, in the afternoons ...
We are from 8:00 to 15:00 only, during working hours,
and the afternoon is ours, They are for children and for us.
-In TBS we have conciliation measures
how is the time compaction, teleworking, secondly,
that is offered to all the workers of the company,
Both parents and not, and time flexibility.
In TBS we rely, mainly, in a horizontal organization,
that is, there is no hierarchy ... obviously, there is a manager and there ...
Some responsible in the computer part,
but it's more for a theme to organize internally.
We always try that all workers
be aware of everything what we do in the company.
Then, normally, yes, we make breakfasts ...
to be able to talk between us what we are going to do
or what is it that would want to modify in TBS,
and we call them as "happiness meetings"
to know if, really, well ... in TBS they're fine, no,
if they would need any modification, if they want something else,
always inside of the measures we can offer.
What does it mean conciliate well and be a good father?
Especially that ... the schedule does not cover the whole day,
because otherwise, as much as you want,
You do not have time material to be with the child.
So, It must be a job that ...
have a schedule that does not occupy all day.
-I really do not know ... what is a good father or not,
but, above all, is to be present with them,
I, at least, is what I see.
What business measures
they facilitate men the co-responsible conciliation?
Measures offered time and flexible hours,
without reduction of income.
For the care of babies:
be able to use the permission of non-transferable paternity,
and 100% remunerated.
For care of children of school age:
working hours
that complement with school schedules,
in particular for people in single-parent families.
Being able to choose a day compact or a shift change.
Have flexibility time of entry and exit
that allows take turns with the couple
in carry and pick up daughter or son of the school.
How can companies innovate
to favor a co-responsible conciliation?
The study reaches five conclusions
to practice the co-responsible conciliation.
Any worker or worker
I should be able to reconcile the employment with his personal life.
Take care of the staff from a long-term perspective,
because the needs personal and family change.
In companies with shift work,
be able to change to another shift or similar position
that facilitates co-responsibility.
Change working hours to offer compact days
It is possible in many companies.
Trust in management individualized weather
and workplace, It's easy with new technologies.