The discussion revolving around the benefits and disadvantages of remote working has been going on for years. On one side, you would find those who strongly advocate that working from the office enhances productivity and overall control, whilst on the other hand there are those who would
argue that allowing employees to work from home enables them more flexibility, hence they will be more productive.
In the past couple of months, remote working no longer remained a nice-to-have, it became a necessity as many organisations had to transition their employees to work from home, in a bid to trudge through the chaos brought about by the coronavirus. In this article, we shall be discussing the ups and downs of remote working.
Sparing the commute
When working from home, you are spared of the daily commute. The impact that this has over your schedule is surely beneficial and will allow you to allocate time productively than just waiting patiently in traffic. So imagine it takes you half an hour to get to work, and another half hour to get back home, you are benefiting from one hour a day which can be used for work related matters. When combining all these hours, that is already over half a normal working day per week!
Work-life balance
This is indeed a tricky one. Whilst it is true that when working from home, you can cater for the needs of your family better, it may also be detrimental as it can become more difficult to distinguish between work time and family time. It is really a question of proper time management. Fail here and you can easily end up spending more time “at the office” when working from home!
Lack of communication
Whilst working a day or two from home can work wonders on helping you focus with minimal distractions, it can also create barriers of communication between you and your colleagues. If communication becomes an issue, it can impact productivity with several misunderstandings that can hurt the delivery time of certain projects and tasks. This can badly influence team synergy and create unnecessary conflicts which could be easily resolved via a face to face discussion or meeting.
Whilst remote working is indeed a convenience and can be used for better business effectiveness, a combination of both working from the office and home is ideal. As we progress to newer ways of doing business, a combination and balance of the two is likely to be key for organisations going forward.
What do you think? Let us know in the comments section below.
