Hays Poland: Work-life balancing options help attract candidates and retain staff

According to the Hays Poland survey published recently, the inability to achieve a work-life balance for 21% of specialists and managers is one of the main reasons for considering changing the place of employment. What's more, 31% of the respondents indicated additional holiday days as the most important non-wage benefit.

Taking into account the needs of employees and the recruitment challenges faced by companies on the Polish labor market, more and more employers increase the attractiveness of their offer. Organizations recognize the potential benefits of providing employees with solutions that help achieve a balance between private and professional life. There are also numerous activities aimed at creating an organizational culture, in which the employee has the possibility - at least partially - to adjust working time to his preferences and does not feel the pressure of working overtime or answering business messages during holidays.

There are also organizations that are going a step further - they offer their employees additional days off, debts and fully paid leave to be used once every few years (so-called sabbatical), and even unlimited holidays. Although employers make attempts to meet the high and precise expectations of employees regarding work-life balance, some of the highly qualified and experienced experts consciously decide to take a break from their career.

LACK OF WORK AS A STAGE OF A CAREER?

Breaks in career are becoming a more and more popular phenomenon on the market. Employed people decide to suspend their work for various reasons. Most often their decision motivates the willingness to devote attention to their relatives, pursuing their passion or improving their health. According to Agnieszka Kolenda, Executive Director at Hays Poland, together with the growing average life expectancy and the prolonging duration of her professional career, in the future professionals will more often choose to decide for breaks in their career.

"Working on managerial and expert positions, but also career in certain professions can be very stressful and mentally burdensome. Therefore, more and more often we are dealing with highly qualified professionals who have decided to give up their professional work for a while to relax - recharge their batteries, spend time with their family and make their dreams come true. In the plethora of duties, it is also difficult to find time for personal development or simply to reflect on your chosen career path, and the period without work is an ideal opportunity," says Agnieszka Kolenda.

For many professionals who decide to take a longer break in their career, it is the desire to develop or change their profession that is the main reason for taking such a step. They devote their free time to acquiring new skills or qualifications, attending courses or completing their studies. They make such a decision consciously, not seeing the period without employment as a threat to career development, but a chance to gain greater satisfaction from work in the near future. The break is first of all a chance for professionals to rest, reflect on their current professional life, as well as set further goals and take development measures that will enable them to achieve them. As a result, they return to the job market motivated, full of energy and convinced of the rightness of choosing a career path, which is increasingly noticed by employers.

A EASIER PATH OF RETURN

Facilitating the return to work for qualified employees who have decided to take a break from their career may be one of the solutions to the problem of skills shortages in the labor market. To take advantage of the skills and experience of talented professionals, some companies create special programs that facilitate returning to work and encourage those who are undecided to make such decisions. Experts quoted in the Hays Journal 17 explain that this is a new solution that finds application primarily in the employment strategies of global enterprises.

"Currently, many organizations, due to the lack of competences and difficulties in their effective acquisition, can not fully use their potential. One of the solutions available is to bring back people who have valuable competences to the labor market, but decided to take a break from their career," says Agnieszka Kolenda from Hays Poland. "Some companies recognize the benefits of activating this group in the labor market and organize programs that are to encourage them. This is a new practice that is currently particularly visible on foreign markets, but we can expect that similar initiatives will also appear in Poland," he adds.

The implemented programs focus mainly on those professionals who have been unemployed for no longer than two years. They usually offer part-time work, which over time is to become full-time. The element that distinguishes between different programs is the scope of support provided by the company in the initial period of cooperation, when the employee is to re-implement new responsibilities and get used to the dynamics of the working day. At this stage are offered, among others training, mentoring or support of colleagues in the first weeks after returning.

According to experts, the cost of implementing a program that facilitates returning to the labor market is quite high, which is why companies should carefully think about it and plan before deciding on its implementation. It is worth analyzing whether the potential profit is worth the necessary financial outlays. It is also crucial to define the areas in which the company experiences a deficiency of competences, as well as to determine which ones can benefit the most from implementation.

These types of programs are also beneficial for the professionals themselves, because they give them the chance to resume their careers in comfortable conditions, and even to acquire new, practical skills. A long period without work carries a certain risk of overlooking important changes and new products in the industry. Participation in the program allows a gradual and comfortable catching up of potential arrears or - in the event of a change in the profession - learning about the specifics of work in a given profession. It is definitely a solution that both parties can use - an employer seeking specific competences and an employee willing to return to work.

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