While the idea of flexible working has been gaining traction in the last few years, many companies are now being forced into remote work strategies. If you haven’t worked remotely before, or it’s not something your business was set up to handle, it can be an intimidating change, that’s for sure. Here our partners, JobLookUp, share their thoughts on the ways in which remote work benefits everyone.
If there’s anything remotely positive to come out of this pandemic, it’s the ability of businesses (and employees) to really find out if working from home is truly viable for them. The demand is certainly there from the employee side, and has been for some time.
In early 2019, the Office of National Statistics released research claiming 50% of the UK workforce will be working from home by this year. Turns out they were right. While conspiracy theorists might be wondering whether this was all part of a CIA/Alien/Illuminati grand plan to make us watch even more Netflix, it’s probably down to the fact that millennials and gen-z are more work-life balance focused, and that technology means it’s increasingly easy to work almost anywhere, depending on the nature of your job.
Apart from the obvious advantages of being able to edit spreadsheets in your slippers, there are some very real benefits for both employers and employees when it comes to remote work.
Better, Happier, More Productive
Some managers and employers might already be panicking at the thought of staff working off-site. Surely, it’s a disaster waiting to happen: Your entire workforce vanishes from the office, only to sit at home watching Judge Rinder instead of hitting your sales targets.
While there certainly are some problem areas when it comes to remote working, they aren’t necessarily what you might think. Productivity certainly isn’t one of them. Several studies show the exact opposite in fact.
Employees that work remotely showed an increase in productivity, although it’s important to note that being able to ‘switch off’ can become an issue if a good work routine isn’t in place.
In the current situation, this also means that many companies can continue to function with minimal day to day impact, although this obviously varies by sector.
Additional research found that employees with flexible working hours and locations tend to be much happier with their work/life balance, and also have higher morale. For employers, this can translate into increased company loyalty and staff retention. Happy employees are much less likely to start looking for a new job somewhere else, after all.
Reduced Environmental Impact
Considering we live in a precarious time when it comes to climate change, remote working gives both employers and employees the potential to greatly reduce their everyday carbon footprint. Fewer employees on-site means less power and heating use, and even less space requirements in the long term.
For employees, less time commuting (or none at all, given the current situation), helps reduce the environmental impact of mass travel.
Accessible Global Talent
Remote working also opens up a huge amount of opportunity for companies and recruiters. Rather than having to find talent in the local or national area, employers can potentially choose from a global pool of applicants.
Working from home means that staff can essentially live anywhere you like, even abroad. Not right now perhaps, but in the long term. This opens up a range of lifestyle possibilities that are simply not feasible with traditional employment, and is a major contributor to the ‘happiness’ factor mentioned earlier. It can help make a company or role much more attractive to candidates as a result.
Reduced Operating Costs
For companies, office costs can be slashed, as well as any related outgoings like travel allowances. This also makes remote working a particularly attractive, and common, option for smaller and newer companies as they don’t need to invest in office space and equipment straight off the bat.
Of course, at the time of writing, many companies are still having to absorb the costs of office space and other sites, but it will be interesting to see if the aftermath of current events change how businesses choose to invest in property.
For employees, there are savings to be made when it comes to travel costs, and outgoings can be further reduced in areas like childcare and animal care. Being able to work from home also means that employees can choose to live outside major employment areas like cities, while taking advantage of more competitive housing prices.
All in all then, remote working could be a sensible option for companies to have in place for everyone, quarantine or not. We’ll certainly all have a clear picture of the advantages and disadvantages in the coming months, and it’ll be interesting to see what happens: Will we all rush back to the office with renewed, even desperate, vigour after being stuck inside for months, or will we all decide that actually, it was pretty good being able to edit spreadsheets in our slippers after all?
One thing is quite likely, at least: A lot of organisations will provision for remote working in the future, just in case anything like this happens again, and that’s no bad thing.
Author biography:
Simon Marshall, Head of Content and Communications at JobLookup.
Simon is a technology enthusiast with an interest in how the application of science, philosophy, ethics, and psychology can benefit us in both the workplace and wider society.
