The Realities of Working from Home | What to Expect from Your Employees
Since the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak, 88% of businesses around the globe have enforced remote work and work-from-home policies to tackle the deadly virus, a survey from Gartner, Inc. concluded.
That’s more than three-fourths of businesses from all over the world running their day-to-day operations remotely.
Indeed, due to the current pandemic, a wave of new, unprecedented norm has swept across every continent of the globe faster than anyone could have ever expected, leaving many companies and organizations with no choice but to embrace the new norm and put it into practice.
Working from home and managing employees from afar is like running an entire business in the “cloud”. Employers and employees are only connected to each other via a vast virtual network.
Surely, to say that this is tricky and challenging would be an understatement. However, it does not mean that this way of leading a company in the “cloud” will not bring a silver lining.
Companies can still thrive under the circumstances brought forth by the pandemic. But first, employers must learn the realities of working from home. Employers must seek to see things from the perspective of an employee who is working from home, and know the ways to manage them well. After all, your employees are your company’s most valuable asset and ignoring this aspect can lead to employee burn out and disillusionment.
The Realities You Hardly Know about Working from Home (WFH)
Making a smooth and seamless transition from working with colleagues in an office to working remotely is definitely possible, but employers need to look through the lenses of employees.
Employees who work from home can be either extremely productive or unproductive.
Working from home provides work-life balance and flexibility, which in turn boosts productivity.
One of the major perks of working from home is that one can avoid all the stresses of commuting to work. The rush hour, the hustle and bustle of the traffic or public transportation could be time consuming and tiresome. But a remote employee who works from home for a company can be relieved from this “burden”.
This means less stress but more time to relax and achieve work-life balance. The amount of time which could have been spent on commuting can be used to carry out recreational activities, personal interests and hobbies with family, friends, or for some catch up on emails. Besides, without having to deal with the usual commute, they will get to rest more, exercise more, and eat healthier. All these contribute to a better lifestyle and overall well-being. When an employee feels happier and healthier, he or she is able to work productively.
In addition, the flexibility of working at home allows employees to start working at any time of the day when they are the most productive. Nevertheless, there is a flipside to it. As different people have different productive hours, exploring this flexibility might make it difficult for employees as well as employers to effectively and efficiently communicate with each other – in real time – on important work-related stuff.
Employees who work from home tend to work around the clock.
While work-from-home employees have the privilege to enjoy work-life balance, it is also easy for them to slip into the groove of working all day and all night.
When a home is where they carry out their work and private life, the boundaries between working hours and non-working hours can become blurry. In other words, work and private life may blend together unhealthily. At home, there is no physical office structure or fixed office hours holding them back. Therefore, the tendency to overwork is high. Although this may sound productive, employees will eventually feel burnt out, exhausted, and frustrated.
It’s not that easy to overcome distractions at home. More discipline is required, which can be challenging.
It is hard to deny the fact that the comfort of home would allow work-from-home employees to work more comfortably than when they were at the office. However, speaking from experience, the familiarity at home could cause a problem of distraction too.
The TV at home, the comfort of the bed in the room, and all in all the ease of access to the comfort of one’s home, could become a real temptation for work-from-home employees. These things may easily rob away their attention and distract them from work. It’s also not surprising to find that one could be so caught up in house chores, that he or she would leave little time to do the office work. Indeed, the lack of a proper office-like work environment at home means that it would require them to level up their self-discipline while working from home, which could be more challenging compared to working in an office that comes with a conducive environment for increased productivity.
Moreover, now that everyone is spending more time at home due to the current pandemic crisis, some of them are facing the real struggle in managing their career and obligations towards the family. This can be physically and emotionally tiring.
Your employees may be battling with mental or emotional health issues while working at home.
As human beings are community-centric, staying isolated for a long period of time may lead to depression or other mental and emotional health issues. But, unfortunately, the prolonged Covid-19 situation means social distancing is still inevitable, and so is the practice of working from home. This actually widens the gap to reach our constant need for having real-life interaction with the community around us. When such a need is not fulfilled, it amplifies isolation, which is detrimental to our well-being. Therefore, work-from-homers can be at high risk of suffering from bad mental or emotional health. It is even more difficult for those who already have a pre-existing history of mental disorders.
When one’s mood and mental health is being disrupted, the ability to function productively surely declines as well.
Your employees who work for you from a distance might not publicly display and express relevant symptoms as well as needs, but all these situations can be real behind the veil of technology which we now often use for day-to-day communications. As much as social distancing or working from home can protect one’s physical health, it does not mean that one’s mental or emotional health can be protected.
Your employees’ team morale may be hitting an all-time low.
Let’s get real. Working from home, can mean working in a scattered manner, dampens team morale. Although remote employees can still collaborate with each other virtually, nothing can beat the physical experience of working alongside a team of people who share the same goal.
Working alone at home for the sake of social distancing could be demoralizing, because one would be missing the surrounding physical presence of colleagues who could not just cheer each other on, but also bolster the much needed team spirit, motivation, and encouragement to get work done. The latter eliminates any possible feelings of loneliness or helplessness, which would otherwise impede productivity. Nonetheless, working from home brings out the opposite scenario. It presents the challenge to address issues, concerns, and doubts as effectively as it would have been in the office. It also makes it harder to foster a vital sense of camaraderie that could boost employees’ morale.
What can we do?
Listen, read between the lines. In times such as these where isolation is rampant, we need to go beyond traditional leadership and the reporting hierarchy to understand what the sentiment on the ground is. Be approachable and interested, your team will thank you for it and we will emerge from this even stronger and better.
James
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