Frequently Asked Questions
General Questions
Your employee classification and type of flexible work will determine what form you need to complete. You can review the Documenting Flexible Work page to determine which form to fill out. If you’re unsure which form to fill out, please contact the Faculty and Staff Engagement team at engagehr@gmu.edu.
You can access your pending, completed, or archived forms at any time by logging into Dynamic Forms and selecting "Pending/Draft Forms" (for pending agreements) or "Forms History" (for completed and archived agreements) on the righthand side of the menu toolbar.
Telework forms are valid for up to one year or until the end date listed on the form, whichever occurs first. If an employee wishes to continue using flexible work after the form expires, they must submit a new form.
For more information on flexible work forms, please visit the Documenting Flexible Work page.
Flexible work agreements may be started, modified, or ended at any time. Supervisors and employees entering into flexible work agreements should work together to resolve any unforeseen circumstances that may arise.
If a decision is made to terminate an employee's agreement, supervisors are strongly encouraged to provide employees with two weeks' notice; however, advance notice is not required.
Approval of flexible work requests is not guaranteed. While George Mason University recognizes the value of flexible work for faculty, staff, and the university, flexible work is not an official employee benefit and may not be suitable for all employees and/or positions. No Mason employee is entitled to or guaranteed the opportunity to utilize a flexible work option.
Yes—with proper approval, you may combine multiple types of flexible work. For example, many employees combine flextime and hybrid telework.
Please note that flexible work is contingent on ensuring that work gets done and that office coverage is maintained.
Yes—You will still need to document your agreement with a telework form.
Note: Please do not enter personal medical information on the telework form. Instead, please indicate the arrangement is due to an ADA accommodation or FMLA.
Compressed Schedules
Employees with compressed schedules receive 8 hours of holiday pay and/or compensatory leave, depending on the situation, regardless of their compressed schedule hours. Leave and pay are pro-rated for part-time employees.
Please review Compressed Schedules and the Holidays for complete guidance.
Employees working a compressed schedule must account for all required hours worked and leave taken.
For example, if an employee working a 10-hour day is out sick, they will need to record 10 hours of sick leave.
- If they wish to apply holiday, university, or compensatory leave in place of sick leave, please note that these leave types (i.e., any leave that is not accrued or awarded annually) are limited to a maximum of 8 hours per day.
- The employee must then account for the remaining hours by either working that number of hours within the same pay period or by using the appropriate leave type (annual, recognition, etc.).
Employees and supervisors should discuss this question during the creation of the flexible work agreement. There may be events or meetings that cannot be scheduled around your flexible work arrangement; your supervisor or department head may require you to adjust your schedule to attend engagements on days you would normally have off.
Flextime
A telework form is required if the employee’s flextime start time begins more than one hour before or after their regular start time. For example, if an employee’s customary start time is 8:30 a.m., a Flexible Work Agreement is only required if the start time is before 7:30 a.m. or after 9:30 a.m.
Full-Time Telework
Yes. All employees who are working remotely outside of the Commonwealth of Virginia (including non-student wage employees and adjunct faculty) must have an Out-of-State/International Remote Worker Request Form on file, submitted by their supervisor.
No. Full-time teleworkers may work at 100% FTE or less.
Any employee who spends most or all of their working hours outside of the traditional place of work is classified as a Full-Time Teleworker, regardless of the number of hours they are employed to work per week. The "full-time" label in "full-time telework" does not refer to the number of hours an employee works, but is meant to differentiate full-time telework from hybrid telework.
For more information, see the FAQ item below: "What is the difference between hybrid telework and full-time telework?"
This form must be submitted by the employee's supervisor; it cannot be submitted by the employee. Please request that your supervisor complete this form on your behalf.
- Employee name, G#, and phone number.
- Work location address (this is often the employee’s home address). The work location entered should be where the work is physically performed by the employee, not the campus address for the department.
- Employee's job description or employee work profile (via upload).
- Employment information, including type of appointment, hours per week, salary, amount of travel required, and any additional compensation offered.
- Department information, including executive level, department, and org.
- The start date for full-time telework.
Hybrid telework is an arrangement in which an employee completes their work at both a university campus/site and an approved alternate site for an agreed-upon period of time.
Full-time telework (also known as remote work) is an arrangement in which an employee spends most or all of their working hours outside of the traditional place of work. Visits to the campus are infrequent, and the position is compatible with (or designed for) off-site work.
You can review ITS's resource Working Remotely: A Guide to Maintaining Continuity to determine which technology and tools you will need for full-time telework. Please ensure that this information is discussed with your supervisor.
Job Sharing
As with any classified staff employee, a supervisor may change the job responsibilities of a position at any time. In the case of job sharing, should your partner leave their position, you will remain at the FTE level you were at before your colleague left. Continuation or termination of the agreement should be discussed with your supervisor and department.
When considering a job sharing arrangement, it is important to understand the impact it may have on your benefits. It is strongly recommended that you discuss the arrangement with the Human Resources Benefits Team (benefits@gmu.edu) before initiating any discussion with your supervisor about job sharing.
It depends. For two classified staff employees to share a position and remain classified, they each must work 50% because a position cannot remain classified if it is less than .5 FTE.
For additional guidance, please contact Faculty and Staff Engagement at engagehr@gmu.edu.
For Supervisors
A supervisor is not obligated to approve a flexible work request. If there is a business need for an employee to be physically in the office, you can reasonably deny the request.
Supervisors should take all options into consideration when determining whether or not to approve a request and consider whether a modified request may be permissible.
- For example, if an employee’s job duties do not allow for full-time telework, consider whether one day of telework per week or teleworking during specific times of year (such as spring break or the summer) is an option.
- One-on-one check-ins: Schedule regular one-on-one check-ins with team members to discuss their work, challenges, and personal well-being. These conversations can help strengthen individual connections.
- Personal introductions: For new team members who are remote, allocate a few minutes in a meeting for them to introduce themselves and share their background/interests.
- Video conferencing: Whenever possible, opt for video calls instead of audio calls. Seeing each other's faces helps create a more personal connection and adds a human touch to conversations.
- Virtual coffee breaks or hangouts: Schedule informal virtual coffee breaks or casual hangouts where team members can chat about non-work topics. This mimics the "water cooler conversations" that naturally occur in a physical office.
- Virtual team activities: Organize team-building activities that can be done remotely, such as virtual escape rooms, trivia quizzes, or online board games. These activities promote collaboration and interaction outside of work tasks.
- Share personal updates: This might be news about your weekend, a new recipe you tried, or a recent book you read.
- Celebrate achievements: Make a conscious effort to recognize personal events (e.g., birthdays) as well as professional milestones (work anniversaries, project successes, etc.). For more information, check out the Reward and Recognition toolkit.
- Establish clear expectations with employees. Ensure that roles, responsibilities, and workflows are aligned so your employee knows what to expect from them (and so you know how best to support their needs).
- When managing performance with remote employees, focus on performance outcomes. Identify and communicate clear goals and objectives, set effective metrics, and have regular performance conversations.
- Maintain effective communication. Ensure that employees have access to the information and resources they need—and that your team stays connected.
- Set up regular check-ins. Provide positive and constructive feedback, and don’t be afraid to address performance concerns.
- Employee name, G#, and phone number.
- Work location address (this is often the employee’s home address). The work location entered should be where the work is physically performed by the employee, not the campus address for the department.
- Employee's job description or employee work profile (via upload).
- Employment information, including type of appointment, hours per week, salary, amount of travel required, and any additional compensation offered.
- Department information, including executive level, department, and org.
- The start date for full-time telework.
Commonwealth of Virginia (COV) App Questions
No. Current forms on file are still valid until the expiration date listed on the form. Employees will only need to use the COV App if they are requesting a new telework agreement or a renewal with a change to the number of telework days.
For those requesting a renewal with the same number of telework days previously approved by the state or temporary requests (14 calendar days or less), all signatures and final approvals will stay in dynamic forms.
For those requesting a renewal with the same number of telework days previously approved by the state or temporary requests (14 calendar days or less), all signatures and final approvals will stay in dynamic forms.
For those requesting a new telework agreement or a renewal with a change to the number of telework days, the dynamic form will serve as the first step. Employees will fill out an abbreviated version of the form to notify HR they need to use the state system. Once the dynamic form is completed, the Faculty and Staff Engagement Team will manually initiate a form using the COV App system. You will receive an email from covapps@vita.virginia.gov once the form is initiated. The employee will then need to submit the COV App form.
Your Employee State or “Cardinal” ID can be found in Patriot Web. For directions on locating your Carinal ID, please see step 4 of these instructions.
You will need to fill out the Standard Telework Request and Renewal Form to notify the Faculty and Staff Engagement Team that you need a COV App Form manually initiated. You will receive an email from covapps@vita.virginia.gov once the form is initiated.
As a reminder, you will need your Cardinal login credentials to access the COV App system. To set your Cardinal login credentials, please follow these instructions.
Please reach out to engagehr@gmu.edu with any questions.
You will need your Cardinal login credentials to access the COV App system. To set your Cardinal login credentials, please follow these instructions. If you run into issues setting your Carinal login credentials, please contact the Cardinal help desk ticket by emailing vccc@vita.virginia.gov and put “CARDINAL” in the subject line.
Please review the state’s guide on how to complete your form as an employee.
You will receive an email from covapps@vita.virginia.gov if an employee you supervise has submitted the Telework COV App. Please review the state’s guide on how to process forms as a manager.
Note: You will need your Cardinal login credentials to access the COV App system. To set your Cardinal login credentials, please follow these instructions. If you run into issues setting your Cardinal login credentials, please contact the Cardinal help desk ticket by emailing vccc@vita.virginia.gov and put “CARDINAL” in the subject line.
Please review the state’s guide on how to process forms as a manager.
The COV App pulls the employee's name from Cardinal, the state’s system. Unfortunately, Cardinal does not currently have a preferred name field.
The COV App pulls supervisor information from Cardinal, the state’s system. If the manager listed on your form is incorrect, please contact EngageHR@gmu.edu.
Inclement Weather/Emergency Closure
In cases where the outage or situation is expected to be protracted, supervisors, in collaboration with the department heads and Human Resources, can make a call to close an office and grant university leave. Before making such a decision, alternate arrangements should be attempted, such as relocating staff or utilizing informal telework or compressed schedule arrangements.
If the situation impacts only one person or a small number of people, efforts should be made to use one of the alternate arrangements.
If an alternate solution is not feasible, individual circumstances will dictate the type of leave to be used.
Employees on a formal or informal telework agreement are expected to work during inclement weather or emergency incident unless conditions prohibit them from doing so.
Full-time salaried employees on a compressed schedule must make up any difference in daily compressed hours by working or taking appropriate unscheduled leave.
Contact your supervisor and ask if you can either telework informally (full-time employees must have 8 hours of work available from their alternate location) or take unscheduled leave by using annual, family and personal, compensatory or overtime leave.
Yes. Safety is the most important consideration. Supervisors and department heads must exercise good and equitable judgment when allowing employees to leave earlier than a scheduled closing, keeping in mind that the office/department must continue providing services until the university officially closes.
Employees who leave before closing time must use an appropriate form of individual leave such as annual, family and personal, compensatory or overtime leave.
If the university closes due to inclement weather or emergency conditions, salaried employees who cannot perform tasks via telework will receive up to 8 hours of university leave per day.
If the university closes due to inclement weather or emergency conditions, salaried non-exempt employees who cannot perform tasks via telework should record the number of hours they were scheduled to work during the closing as university leave.
Wage employees are not paid unless they work.
If you are a designated employee and work on a day when the university is otherwise closed, you will be paid for the hours you work and will also receive compensatory leave for the same number of hours.
Your supervisor or department head will inform you whether you are designated. Whenever possible, you will be informed in writing; however, emergency conditions may arise where this is not practical.
Supervisors should review employee job descriptions and telework agreements to ensure they are up to date. They should identify projects, tasks, and other work that employees can complete while teleworking on days the university closes. Supervisors and department heads must exercise good and equitable judgment when assigning tasks, projects and other work. Supervisors should also recognize that the adverse conditions affecting the university may also be negatively impactful on employees.
As per Policy 2207 Inclement Weather/Emergency Closure, employees with a telework agreement on file should work remotely to continue business unit needs, even if it is not their designated workday.
Non-designated employees with an approved telework agreement must continue to telework their normal work schedule during university closures; compensatory leave is not applicable.
During early closings and delayed openings, employees able to telework or work remotely are expected to maintain their normal work schedules.
Employees are encouraged to work directly with their supervisors to take unscheduled annual leave if they are unable to fulfill job responsibilities and meet business unit needs during the university closure.
If a non-designated employee has no telework agreement but asks to telework or is directed by agency management to telework during an authorized closing, the supervisor may allow this if the employee has necessary tools at the home location to meet system security standards for telework.