Fight for Flexibility: Pandemic Gains Are Fading as Employers Tighten Workplace Control

The Fight for Flexibility report from LiveCareer explores the current state of workplace autonomy and reveals how pandemic-era flexibility is becoming increasingly fragile. While employees continue to push back against rigid schedules, expanding workloads, and narrowing remote options, the data reveals a workforce under strain, marked by anxiety about taking earned time off, cultural pressure that penalizes caregiving responsibilities, and workplace norms that quietly discourage flexibility rather than protect it.

Working Mothers Pay the Price for Rigid Workplace Norms

Despite years of corporate messaging around inclusion and work-life balance, flexibility remains inconsistently applied, with working mothers bearing the consequences. Addressing working mother challenges, the LiveCareer’s Motherhood on Mute report—based on a survey of nearly 1,000 working mothers in the U.S.—found that that parenthood continues to be treated as a professional liability, forcing women to downplay their identities, overperform to counter bias, and make career decisions driven by childcare constraints rather than long-term growth.

93% have been criticized for taking time off or leaving early for child-related needs.
96% have faced pushback for consistently leaving work at a set time due to child-related responsibilities (e.g., having a hard stop at 5 p.m. for school pickup).
55% reduced hours or switched jobs due to childcare costs, while 36% left the workforce entirely.
86% believe taking maternity leave set back their advancement or cost them promotions.

Flexibility Fault Line: For working mothers, flexibility determines access to opportunity. When schedules are rigid, childcare is costly, and bias goes unaddressed, career progression becomes conditional on availability rather than performance.

Time Off Exists on Paper, Not in Practice

While paid time off is widely positioned as a core workplace benefit, many employees report that taking it feels risky rather than restorative. Across LiveCareer’s PTO Trends and PTO Culture Crisis reports, the paid time off statistics shows that fear of layoffs, financial pressure, and unspoken cultural norms are preventing workers from fully disconnecting, even when time off is available.

29% of workers say fear of layoffs has made them hesitant to take time off.
33% feel pressured to not use all PTO accrued and 9% say their workplace actively discourages using all PTO earned.
49% say their employer claims to support vacation, but workloads make taking time off unrealistic.
51% of workers expect to stay at least somewhat connected to work while on PTO.

Flexibility Fault Line: When time off comes with guilt, fear, or the expectation of constant availability, PTO stops functioning as recovery and becomes another test of loyalty. Without cultural support and workload coverage, flexibility remains theoretical rather than real.

Workers Struggle to Hold Onto Flexibility as Employers Tighten Control

As employers expand return-to-office mandates and reinforce traditional schedules, workers are increasingly forced into a defensive posture, fighting to preserve flexibility rather than expand it. This defensive stance reflects a core search for answers on how to fight return to office mandates and find loopholes to current limited work flexibility.

Furthermore, in LiveCareer’s RTO Realities and Predictions and 4-Day Workweek reports, the data shows that flexibility in where and when work happens is valued as highly as compensation, even as companies roll back remote options and double down on rigid expectations.

Two-thirds of workers say they would not give up remote or hybrid work in exchange for a 15% pay raise.
91% know someone who has been required to return to the office, and 86% report consequences for anyone who resisted, including termination or formal reprimands.
67% believe a four-day workweek would make them more productive.
35% say they would trade remote work for a four-day workweek.

Flexibility Fault Line: Flexibility has become a proxy for the workforce’s struggle for trust and control. As employers narrow acceptable ways of working, employees are making it clear that autonomy over time and location now plays a defining role in how work is valued and whether organizations remain competitive.

Too Much on Their Plate: Extra Work Is Burning Out Employees

Many workers are being asked to take on additional responsibilities on top of their regular jobs, leaving them overwhelmed and struggling to maintain work-life balance. The Hidden Costs of Extra Work report shows that constant pressure to accept extra tasks is driving burnout, with few employees able to set boundaries or protect their personal time.

77% of employees take on additional responsibilities weekly or daily, only 11% say they negotiate or set boundaries to say no.
93% report experiencing burnout from extra work, with 59% feeling it frequently.
56% feel pressured and agree reluctantly to additional tasks.
40% experience strained relationships with supervisors as a result of taking on extra work.

Flexibility Fault Line: Employees are caught between organizational demands and personal well-being. The inability to refuse extra work creates ongoing stress and erodes work-life balance, highlighting a critical area where flexibility and support are urgently needed.

The findings underscore that the workplace has reached a pivotal moment around flexibility. After meaningful gains during the pandemic, many of those advances are now being rolled back, even as workers are expected to shoulder more responsibility while navigating rigid schedules, rising caregiving costs, and increasingly blurred boundaries between work and personal life. When flexibility is limited or applied unevenly, it quietly determines who can stay in the workforce, who can move forward, and who is most likely to burn out.

For press inquiries, contact Elizabeth Buccianti, senior manager of public relations, at elizabeth.buccianti@bold.com.

Methodology

The Fight for Flexibility report draws from multiple LiveCareer surveys conducted throughout 2025, surveying between 918 and 1,160 U.S. workers on topics including paid time off, remote and hybrid work, four-day workweek preferences, and experiences with extra work responsibilities. Surveys included yes/no questions, open-ended responses, multiple-choice formats, and agreement scale items to capture national trends in workplace flexibility, work-life balance, and employee well-being.

About LiveCareer

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