Commuting to Dublin is becoming more and more common as house and rental prices in the city skyrocket, many are settling outside of the capital city and travelling in to work every day.
Information from the Central Statistics Office shows that counties bordering Dublin had the longest average commuting time. For example, Kildare commuters took approximately 34 minutes to commute to work. Additionally, a survey earlier this year showed that Dublin is the third worst city in the world for time spent sitting in traffic.
But what if employees didn’t have to spend all that time in their cars? Speaking on KFM earlier this month, our director of nationwide recruitment Jane Gormley said before employees go on a panicked search for ‘jobs near me’, they should look at the job they’re already doing.
“You don’t necessarily have to change jobs in order to bring it closer to home and what we as an agency would always be very mindful of is trying to encourage an employer to speed up and modernise their approach to how people are working and where they need to do it,” she said. “There are flexible options, there are sensible ways of condensing working hours to avoid that peak rush hour.”
Gormley added that both initial interviews and annual performance or pay reviews are all opportunities where an employee can make a case for flexibility within their role, and since it’s a candidate’s market and retaining staff is vital, companies would do well to be open to giving their employees more flexible working options.
For employees broaching remote working for the first time, worries about getting distracted or being less productive can creep in. However, Gormley said the key is to set deadlines for yourself.
“You must manage your job as if you were in the workplace,” she said. “Start at a certain time, finish at a certain time, take breaks at a certain time and just allocate what it is that you need to achieve in the day.”
You can listen to the full interview with Jane Gormley on KFM below.
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Andrew Sheehan is the Marketing Manager at RECRUITERS
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