Remote Work in the New Normal – That Train Has already Left The Station, There is No Turning Back Now

​If you ever wanted to find an opportunity to work remotely, there is no time like right now to explore your options both outside your current organization and also for where you are at now. In the past working remotely was viewed as less productive and not for those who were serious about whir jobs and careers. Since most employers in the past were not very flexible in providing opportunities for folks to try out remote work and demonstrate that this does work well, there was no real evidence to point to for justifying remote work as legitimate value-added service to the organization. And for many of us, we might not have been sure this would work since were never given the opportunity to work remotely. But all that changed since the global pandemic. For many of us, we now have over one year plus of real-world experience to justify our performance working remotely and provide hard data to show the many benefits of working remotely, either part time in a hybrid mode or full time.
And it turns out that there are just many benefits to the employers as there are to employees for working remotely.  Specifically, these relate to the bottom-line profits, which is welcome news for those who wish to justify continuing to work remotely. This really ids a win:win situation and now we can prove it.
Benefits to the Employer
So here are some data points which provide justification of the benefits to employers and organizations for supporting remote work:

• Cost Savings: Companies are saving over $10,000 per employee per year working remotely due to reduced real estate, utilities and maintenance costs. Office space is expensive, so are utility costs for heating, cooling and costs for cleaning and maintenance services.
• Additional Work Hours: By saving on commuting time and now being available during this time, employees have an average of two or more additional hours per day to be productive at work activities and/or actively participating in meetings. Even if the total work day is limited to 8 hours, this means employees have a larger window of availability to engage in activities outside of normal hours, such as meetings with colleagues in other time zones.

• Attracting Workers: Recruiting is easier when remote work is an option. This is seen as a valuable benefit to job seekers. It may convince some to switch employers if they currently do not have this option.
• Low-Cost Benefit: Working remotely, even part of the time (1 or 2 days a week and/or having a flexible schedule) is valued as a real benefit. This costs a lot less than signing bonuses, increased pay or club memberships.

• Resource Savings: People are more likely to accept jobs with lower pay rates than they currently earn in order to enable them to be able to work remotely.  
• Limitless Geography: Employers can attract and recruit people from diverse geographical areas without having to pay relocation costs. More job applicants will be willing to apply for jobs in other areas if they can live where they want.
• Retaining Talent: Turnover rates are lower by more than 20% when employees have flexible work options, including remote work.
• More Efficient Meetings: Remote meetings can be arranged to include people from different locations, there is no need to allow for travel time nor have to find an available conference room. Presentations can be shared and viewed equally by all participants (there is no one closer or farther from the projector or screen).
• Lower Absenteeism: Employees can continue to work remotely if school is closed or children are sick or roads are unsafe to travel on due to bad weather.
• Business Continuity Planning (BCP): Remote work provides for business continuity in the event of bad weather, local outages or limited access to the office such as fire, flood or road closures.
• Lower Carbon Footprint: With less employees needing to travel by car or bus, this reduces fuel consumption and reduces exhaust and carbon emissions. More companies are looking to address environmental concerns and remote work is a quick, effective and less expensive alternative to purchasing carbon offsets and credits.

Benefits to the Employee
For employees working remotely, here are some of the key benefits:

• Resolves Work-Life Issues: Having flexibility allows for managing family commitments and appointments and other life issues in tandem with meeting objectives at work ,versus having the two in conflict. This is a win:win situation rather than choosing one at the expense of the other.
• Reduced Stress: Working in comfortable surroundings and not having to deal with traffic, crowded and delayed transportation and rushing to get out the door is more conducive to taking a calmer more logical proactive approach to work situations versus being stressed out and over reactive.
• Greater Productivity: With a flexible schedule, some work can be done during peak productivity times, i.e., some folks do their best work in the early hours of the morning while others work well late at night.
• More Energy Spent on Working: Less energy spent on getting ready, beating the traffic and commuting. This energy can then be focused on mor valuable endeavors such as problem solving, writing proposals, analyzing data, publishing presentations or completing budgets.
• More Time Available for Self-Care: When time exists for exercise, meditation, medical appointments, connection with family and friends, etc., this results in greater happiness and contentment which leads to improved performance at work.

Hesitations To Overcome / Perceived Obstacles (Not Necessarily Real Ones)
In the past, remote work was seen as play-working, hanging out at home all day in pajamas and having a vacation while getting paid. Remote workers were generally viewed as less productive and less serious about their jobs than workers who came in to the office. A lot of that perception has changed since the great pandemic-induced remote working experiment of 2020, however there are still some lingering doubts and hesitations to address an overcome to change this mindset. Here are some common perceived obstacles to working remotely.

• Lack of Focus: It is perceived that remote workers will be less productive due to the distractions of being at home, like children, household chores, personal errands, etc. Yes, this is possible however this situation also exists in an office setting as folks are on their phones or chit-chatting by the break room or taking long lunches or coming in late and leaving early. The fact is, there some people who will take advantage of the work environment no matter what or where it is located so working remotely is not really the root cause of this problem. The solution to this is good oversight and management of peoples work and holding them accountable for producing the deliverables needed at the time needed. Managers need to judge by results, not by whether someone is sitting at their desk from 8 to 5 every day. If the work is getting done well and on time, then that is what is really important regardless of where the person is.
• Lack of Trust: Some employers just do not trust that their employees will be working unless they are physically watching them. And typically, if you expect the worst from people, they won’t disappoint you. Employees who are treated like irresponsible kids will not feel valued nor motivated to prove themselves as it will not matter to management anyway. Likewise, if you expect the best out of folks and trust them to do the right things more often than not, they will live up to your expectations. Yes, again there are always people who find ways to take advantage and once again the answer to this is good management and holding everyone accountable for their responsibilities. If work is being done well and on time, then this is what really matters. If not, then this is a performance issue to be dealt with and will likely be the same person and same issue even if they are in the office full time.  
• Lack of Collaboration: Remote workers are viewed as working in isolation and lacking in interactions with coworkers. Interaction is key to collaborative problem solving and good teamwork.  The fact is, that when remote employees or teams need to communicate or collaborate, there are more options ad tools available for collaborating than ever before. We now have instant messaging, collaborative document editing, screen sharing, whiteboard exercises, online training, and mobile devices which enable us to be in touch any time from anywhere. Yes, there are some times when it is preferable to be at a live in-person meeting, such as for demonstrating new devices and training new employees, and these are situations where a hybrid approach, such as working at the office part of the day or week as needed.  This hybrid approach results in more focused and value-added time at the office where the important tasks requiring in person attendance get done efficiently and very little time is spent on routine tasks like reading emails or writing documents or data analysis as these can be accomplished remotely.
• Information Security Risk: Remote workers are viewed as a security risk to the information systems and IT infrastructure as it is more challenging to enforce IT security protocols, software patches and information protection plans when people are remotely connected to company networks. This is more challenging but far from impossible. Many organizations have faced these challenges and have developed and implemented workable security solutions. Think about the banking and financial industries. Not too long ago, if you wanted to manage money (something very important to the functioning of our society) you had to physically visit a bank during “banking hours” and meet with a person and sign paper documents to ensure “security”. But now we can log into our accounts remotely online, even on our phones, and perform many banking functions even depositing checks online 24 hours a day. This was considered “insecure” until recently. Now online banking is a workable solution. When there is a will there is a way.

In conclusion, for those employees who want to work remotely, there is real business driven data which supports remote and/or hybrid flexible work arrangements as viable solutions moving forward to support business objectives and improve employee morale, without incurring significant costs. People are the most valuable assets to an organization, a win:win solution on the working environment which satisfies everyone’s needs will separate the top tier organizations attracting the best talent from the rest of the pack looking to go back to the old times.