• Home-based work



• Temporary/contract work



• Flex-time

• "Permanent" part-time
  
• Job-sharing
  
• Short work weeks

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Home-based Work

In this arrangement, employees do their work from home. Home-based work is most common for:

Employers benefit from not having to maintain workstations for employees. Workers benefit by not having to commute and by the savings involved in not going to the office every day.

Some useful information and other sources of information on home-based work can be found at the Canada-Saskatchewan Business Service Centre site. For the legalities and tax advantages of a home-based business, visit the Canadian Business Service Centre.

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Temporary Contract Work

Employers have become cautious about taking on new personnel on a permanent basis. Companies are also finding that more and more of their own work comes in project form. As a result, many employers are hiring workers on a temporary or contract basis. Workers can be hired from agencies or kept on a casual basis. Employers benefit by not making a longer commitment to employees than they know they can meet.

For employees, temporary work does not usually have the same attraction as a "permanent" job, although some workers enjoy the variety and challenges of new projects. However, workers are beginning to recognize that temporary work is a fact of today’s work world.

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Flex-time

Flex-time allows employees to decide on their own start and finish times of work. In most flex-time situations, there are core hours everyone must work. Each employee still works the same number of hours -- such as seven and one-half or eight hours --- but decides what time to arrive and leave, and regulates his or her own lunch time.

Flex-time allows employees to avoid rush hour and to organize their time around their own family situation and their peak energy levels.

Companies need to take care that staffing is adequate during non-core hours.

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Permanent Part-time

These part-time workers have regular hours of less than thirty hours a week and pro-rated benefits (required by provincial Labour Standards). Part-time employment allows companies to staff for the busier times in their business, without having unnecessary staffing at other times. This flexibility is extremely important to service industries in particular. Many part-time workers prefer the shorter hours so that they can devote more time to family life than if they were working full-time hours.

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Job-sharing

In a job share arrangement, two people share one job, splitting the salary and benefits according to a pre-arranged formula. This arrangement allows employees to devote more time to their personal lives while continuing with their careers. Morale is much higher, less time is missed because of family needs, and employers have built-in vacation coverage.

There is more administration with job-sharing. For job sharing to be successful, both individuals need to be very organized; there should be a clear written agreement of what the arrangement will be; and the two individuals need to communicate well. Job sharing agreements are typical for limited periods, which may be renewed. Often one employee is the official "holder" of the job, who has first rights to the job on a full-time basis at the end of the arrangement.

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Short work weeks

Short work weeks generally squeeze the hours of a "normal" work week into a shorter period -- for example, four ten-hour days rather than five eight-hour days. This may save employers one day a week of operating costs for their facilities or allow more overall hours to be worked in a facility without running additional shifts and/or overtime. Employees generally prefer this arrangement since they have longer breaks from work.

Employers need to be careful that customer service doesn’t suffer because of scheduling problems and that safety doesn’t drop because of employee fatigue.