Civil Service - Post Lockdown - Blended Working?

We were told details would be given mid May and online system live from June for applications on WFH. Still nothing and could be September at this stage.

Hi, does anyone know if the DSP specifically Intreo offices are in the office full time or is it blended?

Doesn’t change my point that the survey is too early.

What a knob... there's a reason people are queueing up to get out of DSP, I know people who turned down a promotion rather than move to DSP and I'd never work there again that's for sure.

It all depends on what your workload is like. For us, with various deadlines to meet, you could find yourself doing a lot of extra hours in order to get the work done at times. That wasn’t a problem when you knew you could take the time back as flexileave during a quieter period. It was a way to manage peaks and troughs in workload.

The goodwill has started to run out. If people start sticking to their hours deadlines and targets will be missed.

In my experience over the last two years in two different organisations, even where most people are or were WFH most of the time, those working in Facilities Management/Services areas, Service Officers, and those in ICT Units have had to have a presence in the office. If there's even a handful of people coming in, the building needs to be opened, heated, have someone on reception/security, someone to deliver, collect and frank the post, locked up, etc.

I.T. staff were/are necessary on the ground to do everything from installing additional hardware, prepping laptops and phones to enable remote working, and for helpdesk work where something can't be fixed remotely, etc. Obviously I.T. staff working in development or programming areas can be fully remote.

Why? Why not both? Flexi = flexible. As much as I might enjoy the ability to not start work until 10:00 a couple of mornings because I'm tired, or knock off at 4:00 some evening to beat the traffic, sometimes management need flexibility too, and they need me to work late because there's a deadline, or something urgent has cropped up unexpectedly.

The unofficial Civil Service/Public Service boards.ie Blended Working Survey, May 2022:

125 responses gathered between 23rd May and 31st May. Boards doesn't like images so unfortunately I'm going to have post all of these questions/responses in multiple replies, where I include the charts from Google forms.

Q1 Where are you working?

• CSO - 3
• CSSO - 2
• D/Agriculture, Food and the Marine - 8
• D/Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth - 4
• D/Defence - 2
• D/Education - 5
• D/Enterprise, Trade and Employment - 6
• D/Environment, Climate and Communications - 6
• D/Finance - 1
• D/Foreign Affairs - 1
• D/Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science - 3
• D/Health - 2
• D/Housing, Local Government and Heritage - 5
• D/Justice - 5
• D/Public Expenditure and Reform - 4
• D/Rural and Community Development - 1
• D/Social Protection - 14
• D/Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media - 3
• D/Transport - 3
• Local Authority - 10 (nobody specified which Local Authority they were working for)
• Other civil service body with less than 500 staff - 11
  • CSSO - 2
  • Agency under D/ETE - 1
  • Agency under DOJ - 1
  • ISI - 1
  • OSI - 1
  • Unspecified - 5
• Other civil service body with more than 500 staff - 12
  • AGS/Garda Civilian - 2
  • ATU - 1
  • NSSO - 2
  • OPW - 2
  • PRA - 1
  • Unspecified - 4
• Revenue Commissioners - 15

Q2 What is your organisation's official policy right now, on blended working for most staff (not counting public offices, facilities, ICT staff)?

• Everyone back fulltime - 6
• Four days in office, 1 WFH - 0
• Three days in office, 2 WFH - 28
• Two days in office, 3 WFH - 60
• One day in office, 4 WFH - 10
• WFH fulltime - 21

Q3 What is your organisation's current working regime for staff in public offices/public counters, if applicable?

• N/A - 46
• Left to local management to organise and roster cover - 13
• Back to office fulltime - 13
• Four days in office, 1 WFH - 1
• Three days in office, 2 WFH - 8
• Two days in office, 3 WFH - 0
• One day in office, 4 WFH - 0
• Public office closed - 1
• Don't know - 42

And I must have left this one open to add in your own answers, as there was also:

• Organisation is blended but local office AP refuses to allow WFH - 1

Part 3 - Blended Working Policy

Q7 - Has your employer published a Blended Working Policy since March 31, when DPER released it's framework?

• Yes - 12
• No - 106
• Don't know - 7

The organisations that have published a policy (possibly!) are:

• D/Enterprise
• D/Foreign Affairs
• D/Justice
• D/Social Protection
• Revenue Commissioners

However! In most cases, it was only some of the staff in each organisation who knew that a policy has been published - so this one needs to be taken with a grain of salt! For info, the numbers saying yes, there is a published policy, compared to the total responses from that organisation were as follows:

• D/Enterprise - 1 (out of 6)
• D/Foreign Affairs - 1 (out of 1)
• D/Justice - 2 (out of 5)
• D/Social Protection - 6 (out of 14)
• Revenue Commissioners - 2 (out of 15)

I don't know what's causing the confusion in the likes of D/SP or Revenue - possibly it's only a draft policy, or not all staff have been made aware of the policy?

Q8 When does it come into effect?

Already up and running - 0

Quarter 3 - 7 (D/Foreign Affairs, D/Justice, four of the six D/SP respondents)

Quarter 4 - 3 (one of the D/SP respondents, and Revenue)

Starting next year - 1 (D/Enterprise)

Don't know - 1

Q9 Has your employer indicated that the Policy is for a trial period or is it subject to review?

• Yes - 10
• Don't know - 2

Seems to be for a trial period, wherever it's been introduced.

Q10 What options are available under the policy? (all that were available could be ticked)

• One day WFH, four in office - 6
• Two days WFH, three in office - 8
• Three days WFH, two in office - 7
• Four days WFH, one in office - 6
• Five days WFH - 1

D/Enterprise is offering 2 days WFH.

D/Foreign Affairs is offering 2 or 3 days WFH

D/Justice is offering 1, 2 or 3 days WFH

D/Social Protection - a variety of answers (possibly it's because some people may be working in public offices?): two people saying 4 days WFH is the only option; one saying 1 day WFH is the only option; the rest saying 1 to 4 days WFH are available, except for one who says 1 to 5 days WFH is available!

Revenue is offering either 3 days WFH, or between 1 to 4 days WFH...

Q11 Who decides on your application?

• Not clear - 1
• "HR", a blended working section, no named/identifiable person - 1
• My line manager - 4
• Head of business unit - 2
• An AGS, Director or equivalent - 0

Q12 If your application is refused, or you don't get the option you want, is there an appeal mechanism outlined?

• Yes - 7
• Don't know - 5

Someone from each organisation with a policy did answer "Yes", so we can assume there is one!

Q13 Does the Policy allow some flexibility to staff, or does it just allow for a "fixed" arrangement? (E.g., you could work 3 days in office/2 WFH normally but then vary that, if necessary, say for a project)?

• Yes, there is that flexibility mentioned - 6
• If you want to vary your pattern you need to reapply - 0
• No, no mention of variance - 1
• Don't know - 5

No mention of variance was the answer from one of the Justice people, and other didn't know.

Q14 Does the Policy allow some flexibility to management? (E.g., you might normally have 3 days in office, 2 WFH, but management could roster you into the office for 4 or 5 days to cover leave?)

• Yes - 5
• No - 2
• Don't know - 5

Again no mention of variance was the answer from one of the Justice people, and other didn't know. One Revenue person reckoned yes, management have flexibility, while the other reckoned no, they didn't. Social Protection's management have flexibility to vary arrangements, too.

(That's all for now, time for dinner. The rest later!)

Part 4 - No Blended Working Policy

Q15 When has your employer indicated that it will publish its Policy?

• 113 responses

• By end Q2 - 49
• Q3 - 16
• Q4 - 7
• Next year - 0
• Don't know - 41

Q16 Although your employer hasn't published a Policy yet, are there rumours, hints or indications from senior management on what it will allow when it is published? (Tick all that apply)

113 responses

The "reasonably reliable indications", above, are "reasonably reliable indications, but only unofficial, e.g., line managers, union", and "reasonably reliable indications, officially, but are subject to change", respectively.

Q17 Have your union reps and/or Partnership Committee had any involvement in negotiating the Blended Working Policy? (Tick all that apply)

125 responses

I think the surprising thing here is fully 70% of us don't actually know whether or not our union and/or partnership committee are involved in negotiating anything to do with blended working!