When: Tuesday, December 8, 2020, 4:00 PM - 5:30 PMWhere: Online
Speaker: Dr Suki Sian, Prof. Abigail Marks, Claire McCartney and Natasha Owusu
Webinar hosted by the Centre for Research in Equality & Diversity (CRED), School of Business and Management, Queen Mary University of London
Abstract
Enormous numbers of people have experienced working at home for the first time as a result of the COVID-19 restrictions. Equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) advocates have long called for a variety of flexible working arrangements, including homeworking, to broaden employment opportunities for disadvantaged labour market groups. Therefore this period of altered work practices has forced employers in sectors previously resistant to flexible or homeworking to introduce change, possibly leading to long‐term alterations that benefit working parents, carers or disabled workers, for example. On the other hand, many studies have highlighted the additional labour of childcare and homeschooling undertaken by working women while schools were closed. Furthermore, as periods of homeworking are extended and become the norm for increasing numbers of workers, there are serious concerns about the impact of social isolation on workers’ mental health, as well as questions of staff management, workload and performance monitoring that may have consequences for equality and inclusion.
This CRED webinar brings together new academic research on the topic, with views from key actors in the word of work and will be followed by a Q and A:
Dr Suki Sian, Queen Mary, University of London, New experiences of homeworking in the auditing profession
Professor Abigail Marks, University of Stirling, Findings from the Working @Home project
Claire McCartney, Senior Policy Adviser, Resourcing and Inclusion, View from the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development (CIPD)
Natasha Owusu, TUC Policy and Campaigns Support Officer, View from the trade unions