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This paper aims to consider enforced working from home in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and how it may differ from working from home through choice. In particular, the authors discuss how lockdown may be affecting work-family arrangements.

This is a thought piece.

The paper briefly examines the extant research on remote working. It is argued that as many of the (beneficial) outcomes found for both employees and employers are associated with feelings of greater autonomy and gratitude on the part of employees for being able to exercise choice over their working arrangements, these outcomes may not be found where working from home is required of employees. The authors contend that women, and mothers in particular, have had little choice in relation to when work has taken place, and how much work has been done.

The authors urge employers to consider the positive and negative outcomes of emerging evidence as they review their flexible working policies. They call for a widespread review of childcare provision in supporting women and men in the labour market.

The authors explore this unexpected context of the pandemic and highlight the need for research which examines these different circumstances.

This article has been withdrawn as it was published elsewhere and accidentally duplicated. The original article can be seen here: 10.1108/01425459610116474. When citing the article, please cite: Clare Kelliher, (1996), “Competitive tendering in NHS catering: a suitable policy?”, Employee Relations, Vol. 18 Iss: 3, pp. 62 - 76.

The purpose of this article is to report findings from a major study into flexible working and to examine the link with employee engagement.

The study was conducted within seven case organizations using a mixed method of semi‐structured interviews and an electronic questionnaire.

The findings show that flexible working has an impact on employee engagement through a positive relationship with organizational commitment, job satisfaction and employee discretionary behavior.

Allowing employees a degree of choice over when, where and how much work they do has benefits for the organization. However, for these gains to be realized, support is needed for the implementation of a flexible working policy.

The study included both quantitative and qualitative data and examined the impact of flexible working from the point of view of managers and co‐workers of flexible workers, as well as those who worked flexibly themselves.

The potential implications of the European Social Charter for future human resource strategy within the UK hospitality industry is explored. Four key areas which were subject to change during the 1980s and which are likely to be affected by the proposed Community agreements are identified. This provides a backdrop against which possible results are discussed and some broad conceptual changes in strategy are postulated.

This paper seeks to examine the practice of human resource management (HRM) in the UK voluntary sector. In recent years many voluntary sector organisations have experienced a changing context, where they have become increasingly involved in contracting for the provision of publicly funded services. This paper examines the suggestion made by a number of commentators that as a result the government has exercised influence over the way in which human resources are managed in this sector.

The paper uses data from the Workplace Employment Relations Survey 2004 (WERS 2004) to examine HRM practice in the voluntary sector and compares this with the public and private sectors.

The findings show that most voluntary sector organisations have adopted performance‐oriented HR practices, communication and involvement schemes, and welfare‐oriented practices. This suggests a departure from the relatively unsophisticated HRM that has traditionally been found in the voluntary sector and which may be as a result of the influence of government on HRM standards in the sector.

Future research, which adopts a longitudinal approach, would allow the impact of government influence on HRM practices in the voluntary sector to be examined in more depth.

This paper represents a rare examination of HRM practice across a wide range of voluntary sector organisations and provides insight into the potential influence of government on HRM in the sector.

Seeks to evaluate the policy of competitive tendering for ancillary services in the National Health Service, by reference to a number of case studies of catering services. Argues that the success of the policy was dependent on certain assumptions being met about the extent of competitive pressure and the potential for savings, largely labour cost savings, to be made. Shows by case studies that these conditions frequently did not occur and hence the policy was flawed. Furthermore, even where these conditions did occur, the evidence shows that a range of other factors influenced the extent to which labour cost savings could be made.

Increasingly, evidence suggests that the impact of HRM in organisations is greatest where it involves a set of coherent policies and practices. The implication of this is that, to be effective, individual HR initiatives need to be implemented as part of an integrated package of practices. This paper presents findings from a study designed to examine the implementation of functional flexibility. Evidence is presented from two case studies which demonstrate that, for functional flexibility to succeed in the longer term, it needs to be become embedded in the organisation and to be supported by a web of sympathetic policies. Many of the problems of implementation can be overcome by the co‐existence of supporting practices. For example, the intensification of work brought about by the use of functional flexibility was less of an issue in the cases where it was supported by higher levels of remuneration. The outcomes of functional flexibility for stakeholders are also explored.

The implications of government policy for public sector catering employees are considerable. Pay, conditions of service, hours of work, the effort‐bargain and staffing levels have all been altered to the general detriment of catering workers. There is now greater flexibility of working arrangements for these public sector workers, and managers find it easier to control industrial relations in this environment. Earlier results of research carried out to explore the impact of these changes are discussed and the situation assessed.

The impact of Government moves to put public sector catering out to competitive tender will severely affect some relationships between public sector catering management and staff, a range of employment issues, the skill levels of catering staff and the role of public sector catering management. The employment implications of the contracting‐out exercise in public sector catering in hospitals and schools are assessed.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of new public management (NPM) style practices on public sector managers and in particular on the stress experienced by managers in the UK National Health Service (NHS). Although, ostensibly NPM liberates public sector managers to act more like managers in the private sector, the authors argue that it can also lead to negative work outcomes and high levels of stress.

The authors used a multi-method approach, including 33 focus groups and 15 interviews involving 193 middle- and front-line managers in five NHS organisations; together with a survey of 611 managers in the same organisations. Direct and mediation effects were tested using structural equation modelling; qualitative data are used to illustrate the quantitative results.

An indirect effect, but no direct effect, of NPM use on stress experienced by managers was demonstrated. The relationship between NPM use and stress was fully mediated by a series of work outcomes, suggesting that the introduction of NPM leads to expanding responsibilities, constant pressure to meet deadlines and extended working hours, which in turn leads to high levels of stress.

This paper builds on literature that questions the appropriateness of introducing private sector principles into the management of the public sector, by demonstrating a relationship between the introduction of NPM and high stress experienced by managers. The use of a multi-method design allows both the relationship to be demonstrated and its nature to be explored.