The Secretaries Board's recent release of All Roles Flexible: Principles of flexible work in the APS may reinvigorate flexible working.

Revamped arrangements may also be included in enterprise agreements during the current APS-wide bargaining round.

The Community and Public Sector Union's bargaining claims, and the flexible work principles both envisage arrangements which go beyond the right to request flexible work arrangements contained in the Fair Work Act.

Both are designed to position the APS as an exemplar of good practice in relation to flexible work.

The principles are ambitious, stating that "flexibility applies to all roles, with different types of flexibility suitable for different roles". This is an all-roles-flex or flexible-by-default approach.

Both the NSW and the Queensland public services adopted all roles flex in 2015-16. Usage of flexible work arrangements subsequently increased and became embedded in these sectors. In the APS, the 2016 Gender Equality Strategy required agencies to review job roles and adopt a flexible by default approach.

The 2021-26 gender equality strategy again encouraged agencies to review flexible work policy and practices. It is not publicly known, however, if agencies actually did this. The principles will give agencies a much needed push in this regard.

The principles suggest that flexibility could be available in relation to when, and where an employee works. The document endorses hybrid working, however, agencies will be able to continue capping the number of days in a week an employee can work from home.

We understand that a cap of two days a week working at home is common across the APS.

The CPSU's claim for the current APS-wide bargaining round is for flexible working to be implemented without "undue restrictions", such as a cap on the number of days an employee can work at home.

Given the different positions of the government and union, caps are likely to become a bargaining issue.

Flexible work arrangements are to be implemented against the backdrop of the needs of the organisation, as well as those of each work area. The principles include an example of "anchor days" for teams, where everyone is in the office on a particular day, as a way of attempting to balance individual flexibility with the benefits of in-person collaboration.

The principles also state that flexibility needs to be "mutually beneficial to all".

This concept aims to ensure that flexibility benefits the organisation, the work area/team, and the individual. Research led by Dr Fiona Buick at UNSW Canberra and funded by the Australia and New Zealand School of Government advocates a team-based approach to flexible working.

This takes the burden of responsibility off individual managers, and also encourages greater use of technology, to increase purpose and community among employees.

Even so, the requirement for flexible arrangements to be mutually beneficial may be used by agencies to refuse requests to work flexibly. This would be in accordance with the Fair Work Act provisions allowing refusal of a flexible arrangement on "reasonable business grounds".

Research conducted by the first author during the pandemic showed that while managerial support of working from home had dramatically increased, resistance was still evident.

An education campaign, monitoring and evaluation of the implementation of the principles will be necessary to ensure compliance.

The principles also encourage agencies "to attract talent nationally". The need to attract from a broader labour market is also evident in the government's APS Workplace Relations Policy 2023. This policy sets out the principles underpinning the current round of enterprise bargaining across the service.

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It states that the APS "is under increased competition from large private sector employers" in providing flexible work arrangements in a COVID-normal environment.

It also notes that "such pressure is anticipated to increase over time".

This relatively benign language disguises the urgency of the task faced by the APS - it absolutely must restore its competitive advantage in the area of flexible work.

Likewise, unions will wish to use the current bargaining round to entrench Flexible work arrangements into enterprise agreements which extend employee rights beyond the principles.

Given both sides need to get an outcome on flexible work, we anticipate significant progress to be made concerning service-wide flexibility. The principles are also future-focused and strategic. Endorsing a work-from-anywhere approach, considering technology, and office configurations as working practices change signals to agencies that they need to be future-focused.

This will also assist the APS to be agile.

Strategically, the principles encourage agencies to "consider improving many other aspects of how we work, including recruiting from diverse national talent pools, mobility, learning and development [and] performance management".

This statement indicates a strategic human resource management approach to flexible working. This occurs when all HR practices align to achieve organisational aims.

Recognising that flexible working also interacts with all these other facets will assist in embedding this way of working. It will be fascinating to see how agencies implement the principles of flexible working, and how this manifest in enterprise agreements. Both agencies and employees stand to gain from these developments.