When Remote Work Doesn’t Work—and How to Make Sure it Does
When it comes to creating the best workspace for you and your employees, there’s really only one rule: there are no hard and fast rules.
Before you throw your papers up in the air and walk out of the office, let me clarify. There are proven best practices that successful companies share (keep reading to find out) but there is no one-size-fits-all approach that you can just lift and shift from one company to the next and expect to work.
Technology and society are moving at an accelerated pace of change. We’re a much more diverse community with countless, rich intersections of race, ethnicity, economic background and so much more. So, with increased individuality come increased preferences and possibilities; what may have worked well previously may not be the best approach moving forward. Paying attention to your employees and knowing you’ll need to refine and adjust over time are both critical. However, the most important thing is that whatever strategy you choose, you consider the unique elements that must be in place in order to maximize your chances of success and prioritize experience, security, and choice.
Closing the productivity gap
I’ve seen companies react to work-from-home trends by whipping up a policy and opening up the floodgates of performance freedom. At first, people are happy then…they realize that working-from-home (or an alternate to the office) isn’t as easy as ‘flipping the switch.’ Successfully navigating alternate workplace options actually requires intentional planning, skill building, and behavior cultivation.
You don’t need to take my word for it. Earlier this year, we conducted a survey to better understand what is really happening in organizations across the US when it comes to remote work attitudes, policies and success rates.
Some of the key results included how managers feel about remote work, which reflects the gap between the promise and the reality:
- More than a third of the managers said being able to work remotely two to three days per week would give them a more positive work experience.
- Nearly half believe that allowing employees to work remotely to avoid commuting would be the best way to improve their productivity.
- BUT only two-fifths believe that remote employees are actually as productive as those in the office
Read the full article https://hrt.media/1ib2a