Despite "enthusiastic speculation" about flexible work agreements being the "future" of employment, their long-term feasibility is still unknown, and they are not yet an "inalienable" right, a commissioner has said in upholding the rejection of an employee's request.
An employee's "openly derisive" claim that her employer, in rejecting her flexible work request, confused its operational needs with its inability to manage its own workforce, was a "slap in the face", a commission has chastised.
Widespread adoption of a four-day week could drive some "perverse" wellbeing outcomes, warns a futurist who says the question is not "if" norms will change, but "when".
An employer failed to "fulsomely engage" with an employee and consider all available options when determining her flexible work request, a Fair Work Commission full bench has found in appeal proceedings.
Employers' obligations regarding flexible work, unpaid parental leave and enterprise bargaining change today, while more industrial relations reforms are coming into effect soon.
