The issue of flexible working in public relations is pertinent not only for its potential to improve the industry’s gender diversity and equal pay issues, but also as an alternative business management strategy. Communications teams are increasingly considering flexible working hours as a way to cut costs and improve productivity overall.

The Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) today launched a comprehensive guide to flexible working in PR that includes recommendations for the implementation of flexible working. The professional body’s, Flexible Working in Public Relations guide is released in accordance with its policy work on gender balance and equal pay.

Sarah Hall FCIPR, CIPR board member and owner of Sarah Hall Consulting, comments, “Promoting, guiding and supporting flexible working in public relations is just one route to counter the fact that in senior management roles the industry is losing talented women at an alarming rate, generally at about the time they reach their thirties and attempt to juggle family life with the demands of modern-day practice. Gender aside, public relations is recognised as an ‘always on’ profession, and every practitioner deserves to have working practices that reflect this and support the needs of both workers and clients.”

The guide’s nine recommendations include ‘Create an open process to consider flexible working requests’, ‘Establish and encourage a flexible working structure’, and, ‘Embrace technology and invest in it’. The 28-page guide also includes legal, business, and HR advice detailing the law’s stance on the right to request flexible working.

The CIPR’s policy work on gender balance and equal pay was prompted by the results of the annual State of the Profession survey which revealed that there are more than twice as many men in senior PR roles than woman, and that the industry as a whole experiences a £12,000 pay gap in favour of men.