Critically analysing the concept of workplace flexibility and its impact on employee

satisfaction within the banking sector of Nepal

1. Introduction

2. Literature review
What existing literature says about your topic? Latest Findings? Disagreements? Gaps

Flexible Working Arrangements are agreements between the employees and the
organisation in terms of establishing and working on flexible working environment.
Flexible working environment refers to arrangements in location, working hours, and the
pattern of work in an organisation. Employment leave, telecommuting, Flex-hours, Flex
shift, shift swapping, creative scheduling, work from home, etc are some of the types of
Flexible Working Arrangements (FWA). These flexibility options are set by the
organisations and these options assists in modifying situations and circumstances for
the employees. Flexibility in the workplace has been a common strategy of various
corporate and multinational companies for developing their human resource capabilities
which eventually helps them to retain the best talents ().
A recent study in Romania by (Davidescu et al, 2020) concluded from their research that
FWA acted as one of the major and crucial factors that defined the attractiveness of the
organisation. The research also found out that workplace flexibility provided the
employees with freedom to choose their circumstances which contributed to increase in
the job-satisfaction level and eventually enhanced employee performance. The goal for
sustainable human resource management also aims for long-term objectives with a
focus on employee care, employee participation and employee development and
retention (). In contrast inflexible working environment’s led to various work-related
stress resulting in depression and anxieties, eventually decreasing the overall employee
performance (). A study by Bhusan & Sar, (2020) explained various relationship between
inflexible work sett

Existing research has focused on the severity and risk factors related with work-related
problems. However, less emphasis is given on how flexibility in workplace results in
enhancement in employee satisfaction. Therefore, more research is required to collect
evidences regarding the effectiveness of Flexible work environment on employee
satisfaction.
 3. Aims
The aim of this study is to recognize the effects of flexible working arrangements on the
satisfaction level of bank employees in the banking sector.

4. Objectives

5. Methodology
5.1 Quantitative methodology
The quantitative method focuses on the use of numerical data and statistical tools to
express facts and examine patterns in the research (). This method generally used to measure
different variables and make simple generalisations for a bigger populace.

Sample Plan
For this research, the sampling data will be collected from few ‘A’ ‘B’ and ‘C’ class banks i.e
commercial banks, development banks and finance companies respectively. From 69 banks in
these three classes, data will be collected from about 36 different banks, development banks
and finance companies situated in Kathmandu.
The sample size is huge, so probability sampling is done to increase accuracy and minimize any
type of systematic or sampling biases enhancing the possibility of every candidate’s
participation. Given below is the formula :

Data Collection
To carry out this research, the deductive approach is selected which is suitable for the
requirement for this research as the research topic was picked after studying and reviewing
various reports and peer-reviewed papers. Moreover, it enables the researcher to develop a
conceptual structure to generalise the findings.
The data collection will be focused on the experience of employees of different age groups,
gender, and circumstances on the consumption of Flexible Working Arrangements in their
respective organisations. In addition, various reports from human resource management and
research papers from the Asian regions will be studied to take out and gather secondary data.
The dependent and independent variables will then be separated considering cultures and
various other factors of different countries for further evaluation.
To ensure validity in this research, triangulation of data, theory and method will be done and
expert validity by professors is also applied. Questionnaires for this survey will be based on the
literature review and aims and objectives of the research. The questions will be closed-ended as
() suggest that close-ended questions increases the willingness of the respondent to answer.
There will be numerous sections in the questionnaire structure namely, consumption of flextime,
the experience of implementation and uptake of FWA, and various other options related to
employee flexibility. Likert rating scale () will be applied to the options in the questionnaire. The
final section will include opinion-based questions. Below listed procedures will be followed by
this survey design :
● Firstly, permission letters will be sent to the banking institutions to conduct the survey.
The contact numbers and emails will be asked in the letter.
● The questions will be prepared through Qualtrics and then sent to the sample via email.

Data coding, analysis and presentation.

After the collection of data, it is then checked to identify mistakes and avoid all errors. The
gathered information will be coded through Qualtrics. Then, further processing of data is done
through SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) which is an IBM software. The data will
be entered into the software and various descriptive statistics tests will be done. This T- test
consists of standard deviation and mean which will help to find out the interrelationship between
independent variables. This test will provide the relationship between the consumption of FWA
with demographic, gender, and various other factors, if there is any.

After this, Karl Pearson Correlation test will be carried out to test the correlation between
utilisation of FWA and employees experiences of FWA in the workplace.

Cronbach alpha test will be used for the reliability of this research which must contain minimum
value < 0.6 to be accurate.
The data will be presented through tables, bar graph and pie-chart.

5.2Qualitative Method

Qualitative research is the method of gathering and analysing non-numerical data which helps
to understand different concepts and experiences and answers the ‘why’ and ‘how’ questions
which sometimes cannot be answered by the quantitative research ()
Sample plan
The sample frame for this particular analysis will be taken from the total population of
Kathmandu district. The male and female population was found to be nearly equal totalling 1.72
million. Hence, subgroups will be divided as suggested by the quota sampling technique. This
technique is chosen because data cannot be gathered from the entire population because of
time limitations and geographical limitations.

Data collection
This research will use the inductive logic approach to generate different theories and
hypotheses from the observation of the sample population. As per the division of banks and
financial institutions 3 banks will be chosen from each division and the groups will be formed
accordingly. Therefore, the sample size will be 12. Certificate of participation and other
incentives will be provided to increase participation. As the quota sampling technique suggests,
if someone fails to participate, then as an alternative option another person is to be selected
through random selection.
Firstly, permission will be asked with the head representative of the bank either through email or
cover letter. The survey process will commence by establishing questionnaires. Yes/no
questions will be asked and the title of the questions will be “accessibility of flexible working
arrangements”. Secondly, structured interviews will be carried out to explore the thoughts and
feelings of the candidate towards the FWA in their organisation and their experience on
practicing and adapting to such flexibilities. The interview will be conducted in the bank’s hall or
conference room ensuring the privacy of the candidate. To encourage deep discussions on the
subject more open ended questions will be asked. Both the approaches will help in covering the
necessary elements of the topic and missing out of any important issue is minimized.

Data coding, analysis & presentation

Firstly, NVivo will be used to transcribe the recordings. The data which wa gathered through
primary and secondary methods and the transcribed recording will be analysed by NVivo as it
can analyse the unstructured texts. Content analysis will be used for the evaluation of the two
variables which is ‘available flexible working schemes and experience of practicing those
flexible options’ to know the understanding and experience of the candidates of experiencing it.
The data will be presented through tables, bar graph and pie-charts.

Ethical Considerations:
During the research different standards of ethical and moral considerations will be obeyed to
prevent any misrepresentation and to avoid conflicts and contradicting issues. The important
ethical considerations that should be regarded are confidentiality, assess of relevant
components, honesty, informed consent and do no harm (). Confidentiality implies that
recognizable information will not be accessible by any person other than the researcher. The
researcher will also ensure to assess only the relevant components of the program. The
research will be kept as simple as possible and emphasize on the relevant components required
for comprehensive research. The participants will have complete authority over the participation
and are free to remove their participation at any instance without having any repercussion in the
research process. The participants will not be harmed physically or psychologically which
assertains that no form of pain, stress will be incurred. The person participating in the research
will be fully informed about the analysis being conducted and will be thoroughly explained about
the relevant aspects of the research. All the credits to the original authors will be given and their
works will be referenced.

Limitations:
Every research has many or few limitations and the mainaim of this study is to diminish the area
of limitations.There might be some limitation in the approach of this research. Firstly, collecting
data from and conducting researches could be time consuming. The candidates might not be
interested , so choosing another alternative might cause delays. The datas collected from the
research papers might be biased resulting in inaccurate results. Even though participants from
different backgrounds will be interviewed, the result of this research might fail to generalize the
overall populace of SAARC countries.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/227715174_Flexible_Work_Arrangements_Availability
_and_their_Relationship_with_Work-to-
Family_Conflict_Job_Satisfaction_and_Turnover_Intentions_A_Comparison_of_Three_Country
_Clusters
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260286656_Flexible_work_arrangements_work_enga
gement_turnover_intentions_and_psychological_health

https://www.bc.edu/content/dam/files/centers/cwf/research/publications3/researchreports/Flexibl
e%20Work%20Arrangements%20in%20Asia 2002

In Romania, promoting the law of teleworking transformed labor flexibility into a topic of interest,
becoming an increasingly essential condition required for employment and a motivating factor
for Romanian employees.
Could different forms of work flexibility lead to an increase in job satisfaction and job
performance? This is the main question of our research. In attempting to answer to this question

This paper contributes to the sustainable HRM literature in several ways. First, it analyses the
impact of two important characteristics of sustainable HRM employee development and
worktime and workspace flexibility, grounded in an evidence-based approach on two major
outcomes of sustainable HRM (job satisfaction and job performance), contributing to the
diminution of the gap in scientific knowledge especially at a national level. Second, the paper
offers a first attempt at investigating the impact of the new forms of workspaces on job
performance, job satisfaction, personal time and space management, level of comfort, level of
organizational performance, level of personal and professional relationships, level of
professional development, and the overall level of work motivation. This is particularly important
when taking into account the restrictions regarding social distancing in the context of the current
health crisis. Third, the paper considers a multi-dimensional approach of work flexibility from the
perspective of working time and workspaces as well as employee development, which is
considered to be an important characteristic of sustainable HRM. Fourth, the paper provides, to
our knowledge, a first composite measure of work flexibility seen from different angles at an
individual level that offers a global view of the main elements of flexibility present within
Romanian organizations. Furthermore, the paper analyzes how this synthetic measure impacts
employee job satisfaction as an important outcome of sustainable HRM, thus highlighting the
way in which the HRM needs to be redesigned.
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/15/6086/pdf 2020