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But when you compare your idea of flexibility to your company’s view of flexibility you’ll find a big gap. Even companies with the best of intentions can’t deliver on their own promises, because flextime doesn’t solve the core problem of work. In fact, traditional alternative methods of work are actually part of the problem.

Let’s go back to Addie, our new, young employee. Addie looks at her employee handbook and notices that her company offers a flexible work arrangement option. She’s excited. If leaving a little early on Fridays after finishing her work isn’t acceptable on an informal basis, then maybe she can formalize the flexibility by taking advantage of the company’s policy. She realizes that if she could just telecommute on Fridays, then she could get a jump on her weekend while still meeting the needs of her team.

But her manager is cool to the idea. First she says that that program is really more for people who have a proven track record with the company. Addie counters that even though she is new she has gotten nothing but glowing reports on her work. Furthermore she says she is willing to address any performance questions as they go and if it’s not working to make the appropriate changes. Addie’s boss immediately agrees that whatever arrangement they might come up with would certainly be under great scrutiny. “We can’t just have people off doing whatever,” she says. Then her boss says that in fact it would probably be better to revisit this idea after they clear their current slate of projects. Addie pushes and says she thinks she can handle it now, that between voice mail and e-mail and secure remote access to the company’s computer system that it won’t even be that different from her being there. Her boss says that it’s probably not best. People are already talking about her laissez-faire attitude toward time, and maybe Addie should first buckle down for a few months and show everyone that she is committed to the company by keeping regular hours. Then they can talk. “But I have to warn you,” Addie’s boss says. “It’s a long shot. There are a lot of people in line ahead of you for a perk like this. Let’s face it. If I let you do it then I have to let everyone do it.”

Addie’s encounter with her boss shows the three main problems with traditional flexible work arrangements. First, there is almost always limited access depending on seniority, title, or job description. Flextime or telecommuting is for managers and directors, not administrative assistants or entry-level people. Flextime or telecommuting is for people who have project-oriented work, but not for people who are part of a daily process, such as people who work in a call center or on a customer service line. Those “frontline” people have to have their asses in a seat.

Most of all you have to earn the right to be on a four-day week. Flexibility with your hours or the ability to work from home are the kind of ultimate perks for those who are so good, so accomplished that they can flout convention and strike out on their own. You have to earn these privileges, even though all you’re doing is shifting from five eight-hour days to four ten-hour days, even though you’re still doing the same job. Only rock stars get to have a say in how they spend their time.

Second, flexible work arrangements are conditional. They are a privilege that can be taken away at any time based on the needs of the business, not the employee. We have a copy of a pamphlet from a major computer company that touts their understanding of people’s need to work more flexibly. (You know they mean it because the cover shows a picture of a pile of rocks balanced each on top of another to show, you know, balance.) But the more closely you read the pamphlet, the more that pile of rocks starts to look precarious. Employees still need to work core hours; they might lose their flextime if there is a perceived business need; and each person’s capacity to participate in the program will be assessed on an individual basis and will be subject to periodic