Are flexible bank holidays the key to a more inclusive workplace?

We will have had three bank holidays this May, and let’s be honest, an additional day off is something that we all look forward to. But in a world where flexibility at work is key and diversity and inclusion is a must for talent attraction and retention, Kerry White, Associate Director at Macmillan Davies shares her thoughts on whether fixed statutory bank holidays should be a thing of the past.

Four of the UK’s eight standard bank holidays are tied to Christian religious festivals and most businesses have a multi-faith workforce which is meaning many workers may be required to use their personal holiday allowance to take a day off that is central to their beliefs or communities.

According to the 2021 UK Census, 57 per cent of respondents in England and Wales said they are religious in some way, with 46.2 per cent identifying as Christian (a 13.1 percentage point drop since 2011). According to the CIPD, “91 per cent of HR managers say their organisation promotes understanding of diversity and inclusion with regards to religion and belief to some or a great extent,” yet “only a quarter of workers agree this is the case” leaving a huge disconnect between what employers believe they are doing, and the impact these are having on employees.

A shift is coming

Our latest LinkedIn poll asked, ‘Is your business considering personal bank holidays?’, 66% of respondents stated they were currently considering it, or they would consider implementing this in the future. Only 11% said they wouldn’t consider a change, with the remining 22% feeling that this wouldn’t work in their business.

With large businesses such as Grant Thornton and PWC, leading the way and already having implemented a flexible bank holiday policy, are more businesses set to follow suit?

Pam Southern, HR Director at Telcom Group has recently introduced a policy on flexible bank holidays:
“As a business, our policy means employees can choose to swap a religious bank holiday for another – for example, the two Easter Bank Holidays for Eid. We want to ensure that as a business we are inclusive of all religious celebrations, so people shouldn’t have to use their own annual leave allowance for certain religious holidays. The world of work is changing, and we need to be flexible and adapt with it.”

But in some businesses, a bank holiday “shutdown” isn’t possible, particularly those with 24/7 operations or in industries such as utilities, manufacturing, hospitality, travel, and retail. The majority of these employees have a specific amount of annual leave with bank holidays not specified. These businesses already have this as part of their operating model and make it work, could the corporate world learn from this?

From talking to a variety of HR Leaders, we are hearing more and more about organisations creating inclusive holiday policies, particularly for religious holidays, but should the flexibility extend beyond religious bank holidays to include cultural events such as Pride, and be done for ALL the bank holidays?

We know from our latest HR Insights survey that talent attraction and retention will be the number one ‘time stealer’ for HR professionals over the next three years. Businesses need to be looking outside the box with initiatives to promote flexibility at work and I believe that introducing policies such as ‘inclusive holidays’ could be one of the solutions.

Get in touch

Should you wish to have a confidential chat with Kerry White to discuss the current HR market or your search for work/recruiting into your team, please contact her directly at kwhite@mdhr.co.uk

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