FLEXIBILITY AND INFLEXIBILITY BUSINESS VOCABULARY IN USE (ADVANCED)

 

BUSINESS VOCABULARY IN USE (ADVANCED) 5. FLEXIBILITY AND INFLEXIBILITY

 

A Ways of working Nordland is an advanced industrialized country. In addition to outsourcing some functions to freelancers, many organizations there are looking for ways of having more flexible working, for example: • temporary workers who only work for short periods when they are needed, either on a temporary contract with a company, or through a temp agency. • part-time workers who work less than a full working week. • job sharing, where two people share a particular job, each of them working part-time. B Job flexibility The government of Nordland is trying to encourage this kind of job flexibility, and it has passed laws that allow companies to hire and fire employees easily. When letting people go, companies only have to give them two weeks’ notice and relatively small redundancy payments; one week’s salary for every year worked is the norm. C Job protection Sudonia is an advanced industrialized country with a very different approach. Companies in trouble are only allowed to make employees redundant after a long period of consultation. If employees are made redundant, they receive generous redundancy payments and then unemployment benefits. The government says people need this sort of job protection, and trade unions are fighting hard to keep it. Payments to employees such as sick pay, and parental leave when they have time off following the birth of children, are also very generous. Mothers get 18 months’ paid maternity leave and fathers get six months’ paternity leave. But the social charges which employers and employees have to pay the government are very high. EXERCISES 5.1 Look at A opposite. which Type of work is each of these people referring to? 1. I work at the local council for two days a week, and my friend works in the same job on the other three days. 2. I work in a petrol station 20 hours a week. 3. I’m on a job at Clarkson’s until the end of the next week. Then I’ll try and find something else. 5.2 Melinda and Nigel, two managers from Sudonia, are talking about the issues in B and C opposite. Replace the underlined phrases with expressions with items from those sections. Pay attention to the grammatical context. (The first one has been done for you.) Melinda: It’s ridiculous! We can’t get rid of employees without a lot of meetings and discussion with employee organizations, government officials and so on. We have to keep even the laziest, most incompetent people. We can’t make employees redundant without a lot of consultation with trade unions, government officials and so on. We have to keep even the laziest, most incompetent people. Nigel: I know what you mean. I don’t have the opportunity to recruit and get rid of people as I want! This sort of rigidity must be bad for the job market. The number of people without jobs in this country is very high. 5.3 Look at the expressions in B and C opposite and say if these statements are true or false. 1. When companies let employees go, they make them redundant. 2. One person’s job flexibility might be another’s job insecurity. 3. In flexible job markets, hiring and firing is complex.

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