Home office is worth doing

Lack of contact with friends or family is one of the greatest sacrifices made by citizens in times of pandemic. In the absence of weeks (according to the most optimistic forecasts) to return to our lives and be able to go back to the streets, we have to continue working. Apart from the logistical problems caused by exceptional situations such as what we are experiencing, the home is often considered to be the least productive place to work. Is this true?

The concept of home office appeared in the 1950s in the United States because of Norbert Wiener's research in the field of cybernetics. With the development of new technologies, this practice spread first to Anglo-Saxon countries before reaching Spain and much later to Latin America where the percentage of home office is very low.

Summary

An uncertain situation for everyone

The incidences of the current health crisis on our lives are multiple. The world of work is no exception. Anyone who has seen the news can attest to this. The media have published a series of reports that show workers sitting in their kitchens or rooms with their computers in front of them. The written press has also been dedicating many articles to employees forced to stay home due to the health crisis. There is no shortage of examples of employers like large companies that have instructed their employees to stay home. Even large institutions like the Frankfurt-based European Central Bank (ECB) have asked their thousands of employees to work from home.

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The terminology is also adjusted to the situation since there is talk of "adjusting the job to a crisis situation" and the labor laws are cited to clear up the doubts of the workers about the risks of losing their jobs. At the European level, most national legislation provides for devices to protect the worker from an abrupt change in their employment contract. On the other hand, disciplinary sanctions are envisaged for the most recalcitrant workers as part of a legal process aimed at protecting both the health of individuals and the economic survival of companies. This is not the case, with reason, in the case of certain companies in the restaurant or hotel sector that have dismissed their workers who had an hourly contract or were not on the payroll.

Work from home: A leap into the void

Days go by and the number of people working from home increases accordingly. Now the main unknown is not so much the number of days we will have to stay home, but the impact of this change on our productivity. That is why tips on how to survive during this period abound on the net and each share their own tips on how to stay focused at home: maintain a daily routine, dress in the morning as if you were going to work, use the Zoom applications or Evernote, stay away from mobile, etc.

Professional Chat

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Home office / Olesya Kuznetsova / Shutterstock

Productivity working from home is a recurring concern for both employers and employees. However, we have been able to verify the amount of testimonials online that defend the home office and how people feel freed from professional interactions in the framework of an office. There are even articles by sociologists or organizational management specialists that extol the merits of this activity. For example, some comments consider that working at home improves the management of work time, offers a greater concentration on the main tasks and favors an increase in the quality of work.

However, there are serious obstacles to the development of this device. The first and most obvious is the tenacious idea that working from home carries with it a neglect of professional activity. Of course, not all professions require or are compatible with the home office. In reality, the vast majority of jobs include activities that are carried out through direct contact with clients, patients, students, the public of all kinds, etc.

Apps to be more productive

It is normal for several managers to be concerned about decreased productivity. Not being able to directly control employee productivity is a real leap for many of them, especially for those who are very afraid to delegate or who know that several of their managers will need more time to adapt. However, for Gabrielle Tremblay, from the University of Quebec's School of Business Administration, whose comments are published in the Canadian newspaper L'Actualit, one should not be so afraid of the unusual situation that the world of work is going through:

There is a great myth around the home office. (Some executives) are concerned with falling productivity, while studies show otherwise. (…) Sometimes there is an increase in productivity. In other cases the quality of work is increased because many times people may have some difficulty concentrating in the office and the home office allows them to do so.

Concentration and motivation before anything else

The productivity of a home office worker is quite difficult to assess. The reason is very simple: This poorly supervised activity can backfire for two main reasons. First, it can be very difficult for the worker to separate his private life from his working life. To remedy this, you therefore have to create a home workspace. Unfortunately, not everyone has adequate or large enough apartments, particularly all those who live in big cities (think of Paris, New York or London, for example). Second, the home office is not suitable for people who have difficulties managing their autonomy or, worse still, who have a certain psychological fragility that can lead to work addiction. These elements must be taken into consideration by the employer, even in the event of an epidemic.

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In general, employees have a favorable opinion of the home office. One of the largest surveys carried out two years ago in western countries (USA, UK, Germany and France) confirms this opinion. This study even shows that the only real challenge for workers remains concentration. Above all, it shows that there is no direct correlation between office hours (9 am to 6 pm) and the ability to stay focused. For the director of that survey, EMEA North Director Nigel Dunn is not so much a matter of working hours, but rather the fear that companies have when it comes to addressing productivity issues:

And it is mainly due to lack of confidence. Employers are understandably nervous about not being able to monitor their employees, but there are solutions. With today's technology, it is easy to communicate with employees remotely. They also allow employees to collaborate no matter where they are.

The study concludes that home office is an essential activity within the search for optimization of conventional workspaces. On the other hand, the results of the team led by Nigel Dunn show that employees consider that they lose time due to the multiplicity of meetings that they do not have time to prepare well or in decision-making processes. According to this research, workers would have the feeling of escaping the limitations that exist when one works in an open space during the week. In his recommendations, Dunn believes that the most important thing is that the person can stay motivated and focused no matter where he is.

As evidenced by numerous testimonies on the subject and research such as the one previously mentioned, workers are already mobile outside the office walls. Employees are now more connected, can do so from home, and tend to spend less and less time in the workplace by choice or by management policy. The unproductiveness of the home office is, therefore, a false problem. The key is to stay motivated and focused. In the end it depends on each one of us. It mainly depends on whether or not we are motivated by our work. If you hate your job, doing it in the office or at home doesn't matter.

Good luck to those of you who are doing home office. It is not easy. Nothing is ever easy. The writer has been locked up for more than a week and also has to take care of his 2-year-old son. Who knows how long?

Do you work at home due to the pandemic? How do you feel working from home? Leave us your comment below.

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