Stop Calling Remote Work a 'Benefit'

The discourse around remote work is contradictory and confusing. Some laud the enhanced productivity and work-life balance, while others rue the lack of social interaction while working from home.

Across industries, the consensus is remote work allows for higher savings on fuel and commute. But others regard it a bad deal since remote workers risk a stinted career growth, despite hitting the same KPIs as onsite employees. If there’s a common thread unifying these diverse narratives, it’s either the benefits or drawbacks of remote work for dominant working groups.

But what that misses is the value of remote work for marginal working professionals. Though recent coverage has touched upon how remote work ensures greater workplace diversity and empowers women, other groups still find their voices missing.

When Ridhi Chaturvedi (F 24), previously employed with Sage - a leading academic publisher - praised remote work, saying

with a neurodivergent mind, working in a familiar environment really helps in focusing and avoiding stress

I understood what she meant, having been in touch with people with periods who experience problems like premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), endometriosis, and painful cramps. But it doesn’t have to be that extreme for marginal groups to choose remote work over on-site roles. In a quote for the Centre for Health Journalism, Sheri Munsell, a black woman, shared her working experience at a retail store back in the day. Munsell described that

every day when I came home from work, I was already exhausted from gritting my teeth all day and not responding to people

Adding to that stress was the racial bias she experienced at the hands of her employers, who admitted to “checking her cash box more often than her white colleagues,” underscoring the link between racial discrimination and mental health.

A 2021 study by Shanting Chen and Allen B. Mallory on the effect of racial discrimination on mental and physical health added to the growing database of research on the negative association between racial discrimination and health, finding people “who reported ever experiencing racial discrimination were about 5% higher CVD risk, had 0.12% lower SRH, a 3% higher probability of a depression disorder, and a 2% higher probability of a substance use disorder.”

The mainstream workers may struggle with job pressure to meet and outperform expectations. But that’s only one concern for people suffering from mental conditions such as depression and anxiety. Alongside managing daily workload, they brave debilitating breakdowns, impacting not only their ability to be productive and efficient at a work but also their physical and mental well-being.

The link between gender, race, and mental health in the above testimonies underscores how the dominant discourse reduces a widely disparate work experience and privileges able minds when the lived reality is starkly different. For individuals like Ridhi and Sheri, remote work is not a nice-to-have perk or benefit. Instead, it’s the bare minimum to be meaningfully employed.

It acts as a shield against a toxic work environment and microaggression from hostile colleagues.

As someone with borderline personality disorder, Ishita (F 26), previously with India’s largest digital products company, agreed and praised remote work for the freedom from

putting my best face on before meeting people. On most days, it is as simple as having the option of not having to do that.

The implicit expectation of leaving personal life at home when coming onsite seems outrageous, in the words of Patrice Le Goy - a licensed marriage and family therapist - when you

think about someone who might experience depression or anxiety, for example, you can imagine how difficult it is to put on the front of everything being OK for eight-plus hours a day.

But a lot also depends on the severity of the mental health disability. While depression and anxiety can make normal day-to-day operations impossible, the impact of lesser-known conditions like premenstrual dysphoric disorder can allow individuals to go on with normal work schedules without worrying about losing their job continuously.

Affected by a severe hormonal imbalance that causes infrequent bouts of depression, suicidal ideation, and emotional breakdowns before each cycle, women also seek remote options for flexible timings so that they can manage their workload efficiently during hard times.

Like Sheril, Kim Kibby, a graphic designer, shared their experience working onsite in the same feature for the Centre for Health Journalism. After being remote for nearly a decade, she accepted an in-office role and underwent

a culture shock to find herself in a cubicle farm with constant interruptions, freezing temperatures, and noise.

On diagnosis, she found herself suffering from mild misophonia, a condition in which certain sounds, like people eating or typing, set off an intense emotional reaction. To cope, Kim wore noise-canceling headphones with white noise or music until she couldn’t take it and had to quit.

Traditional setups with inflexible timings and excessive sensory stimulation don’t work for mentally-disabled individuals. But for physically-challenged and LGBTQIA+ folks, accessibility issues, single-gender washrooms, and rigid dress codes lead them on a search for inclusive spaces. LGBTQIA community makes 5.9% of the US workforce and has a history of being denied federal government jobs, protections, benefits, insurance, and equitable protections.

For the Centre for Health Journalism feature, writer Adryan Corcione shared how they went through the stress of living an inauthentic life and felt pressured to wear their cis roommate’s hand-me-downs to fit in the office life.

In their words,

[b]efore I was ‘out’ at work as non-binary, I recall hearing microaggressive comments about the way I dressed … and was expected to wear dresses and heals as part of this unspoken dress code.

They worked for three months in the role before calling it quits. But Adryan’s is hardly a one-off case. In an article titled “Being transgender at work” on McKinsey and Company, authors revealed that, in corporate America, more than half of transgender employees reported feeling uncomfortable being out at work and felt far less supported than their cis counterparts. To quote, for these individuals,

it’s more difficult to understand workplace culture and benefits and harder to get promoted.

The same’s the case in India, where, as reported by Anindita Sen for the Financial Express, LGBTQIA+ employees “face workplace harassment, discriminatory treatment, and limited job opportunities.” And therein lies the true value of remote work. Not only does it make navigating the workplace easier for different marginal groups like colored people, women, mentally disabled, and LGBTQIA+ but also allows them to take a break and seek support when needed.

Employers can be inclusive and alleviate some of the concerns by eliminating dress codes, on-site attendance and fixed working hours to address some of the challenges faced by these group. But the final decision to or not to join their team onsite should rest with the employees.