Is Working Remote A Blessing Or Burden? Weighing The Pros And Cons – Forbes

Working from home is a mixed bag, according to recent studies.

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Saturday, June 20th is World Productivity Day. What better time to weigh the pros and cons of productivity after the sudden and unprecendented shift to working remotely as a result of the pandemic. COVID-19 has impacted nearly every aspect of our daily lives, including overall productivity. We are seeing shifts in activity levels, changes in daily schedules, how employees are staying on top of things outside work and productivity tool usage. Many major tech companies have announced plans to allow their employees to continue working from home for much of 2020. Others are making the shift more longstanding. Twitter announced that employees would be allowed to work remotely “forever,” and Amazon CTO Werner Vogels described the transition to cloud-based work environments as “permanent” at the AWS summit in May.

Despite all the positive press about working remote, some studies suggest it’s not what it’s cracked up to be. Social isolation, employment uncertainty, WFH burnout and the virus itself have combined to shock the health and well-being of workers worldwide. With remote employment on the rise, studies report pros and cons in terms of productivity and mental health from one study to the next.

Negative Findings On Working Remote

In a global study conducted by SAP, Qualtrics, and Mind Share Partners, researchers surveyed more than 2,000 employees in March and April of this year in Australia, France, Germany, New Zealand, Singapore, the UK and the United States. They found that the pandemic is impacting mental health around the world. Over 40% of people said their mental health has declined since the COVID-19 outbreak. In that same time period, the number of people who describe the state of their mental health as a 3 or less on a 10-point scale has doubled. Workers report more anxiety and stress.

Another study conducted by Udemy of over 1,000 U.S. employees found that 89% are afraid of COVID-19 in the workplace and their fears have compromised their job performance. The survey found that the worry spikes correlated with increases of new COVID-19 cases.

According to a study of over 1,000 remote employees by Twingate, remote employment is causing workers to lose a sense of work/life balance during the pandemic. Their findings include:

• 45% of employees reported attending more meetings during the pandemic than when working in the office, compared to 21% who attended fewer meetings.
• 40% of employees have experienced mental exhaustion from video calls while working remotely.
• 59% of employees felt more cyber secure working in-office compared to at home.
• 22% of employees working from home purchased a VPN during the pandemic.
• 58% of employees reported discussing sensitive information on work video calls.
• Over 1 in 10 employees had their video calls hacked while working remotely.

A Doodle, survey of more than 1,100 U.S. employees also cited symptoms of burnout among employees. Key findings were:

• A full week of virtual meetings leaves 38% of employees feeling exhausted while 30% felt stressed.
• Performance anxiety and business pressures push employees into competitive mode. 63 % of employees were likely to record and re-watch their virtual meetings to help them become better presenters and strengthen their client relationships.
• Noise throws online meetings off-track and leads to miscommunication. 52 % of employees said background noise and/or poor audio quality disrupted their focus, while 23 % said it leads to miscommunication with clients. In particular, talking in the background (55%) and notification alerts (20 percent) are the two most disruptive types of background noise.
• Even if the future of work is remote, in-person client meetings will always be in demand. 40 % of employees are less likely to meet clients virtually once the government-imposed lock downs and social distancing rules have been lifted.

Positive Findings On Working Remote

On the flip side, a YouGov survey for Evernote revealed the opposite in terms of work/life balance. As the pandemic continues to unfold, 48% of Americans are living life at a slower pace since social distancing began and 51% are broadening the definition of productivity to not only work, but projects at home such as cooking or home improvement. It’s clear that “Hustle Culture” is no longer a reality for many, and it may stay that way for some in the post-pandemic world. “It’s heartening to learn that people are staying productive during the pandemic, whether at a slower pace or by picking up a new skill,” said Michele Don Durbin, Evernote’s Senior VP of Marketing.

Other studies show that almost 60% of Americans think COVID-19 has changed the way we work for the better, according to a WalletHub study of a nationally representative Coronavirus and Working from Home Survey. WalletHub examined Americans’ thoughts about working from home during the Coronavirus pandemic and a potential return to an office, including how being at home has affected productivity and what people miss most about the office. Below are highlights of the survey, along with a WalletHub Q&A. 

• Harsh penalties for not returning to the workplace. A third of Americans believe businesses should fire employees who refuse to go back to work. However, 67% think people who don’t want to return to the workplace should NOT be fired, which shows that most people are sympathetic to those who would rather work from home, according to Jill Gonzalez, WalletHub analyst.
• Parents’ work efficiency may suffer at home. Around 50% of parents with young children at home don’t think they are more productive working from home.
• Working from home seen as the future. Almost a third of Americans think that physical offices are a thing of the past.
• Positive changes to the work environment. Almost 60 percent of Americans think COVID-19 has changed the way we work for the better.

The majority of studies show that employees have positive reviews of how employers handled the hasty shift to working remote. A Glassdoor study showed that 70% of respondents felt that their employer responded to employee concerns about health and safety matters. Another 60% said they can perform effectively no matter how long they have to WFH and 50% say they are as or more productive remote working. Close to 99% of respondents to a Korn-Ferry study reported that their employers are showing empathy toward staff. Another 85% of those respondents also feel that their employers are doing a good job of communicating and informing staff about the company’s situation and ongoing response to the pandemic. A study by Citrix found that 45% of workers believed employers were “fairly ready” for the transition to working remote, and 38% said the transition was “fairly easy.” A survey of more than 11,000 full-time workers by Reflektive, found that HR departments were most likely to feel unproductive and overwhelmed and customer success teams reported the lowest engagement; however, two positive areas emerged in regard to how companies handled the pandemic shift to remote working: 

• 91% of employees felt supported by their managers during the shift.
• 92% of respondents strongly felt that their companies took appropriate measures to address the situation.

Rachel Ernst, VP of Employee Success, Reflektive, explains the importance of staying in tune with employee sentiment to boost morale and performance during this unprecedented time: “One key finding of the sentiment results is the impact on HR teams. HR departments reported that they feel less productive—about 12% below their peer average. HR professionals are working tirelessly to help employees cope during the current crises. Many of my peers are focused on workforce planning, determining the additional resources employees need in their new work environments to addressing mental health. While the pandemic has altered so many aspects of everyday life, now is the time that HR teams can come together and build impactful programs for their workforce.”

For Better Or Worse: A Final Word

In terms of pros and cons of remote working, Vanessa Tierney, CEO and Co-founder of Abodoo, a data-driven skills matching platform helping businesses and governments transition to remote working, concludes: “While the complexities of remote working have also been laid bare, the benefits far outweigh the disadvantages and moves from tech conglomerates such as Facebook and Twitter to allow their employees to work from home forever, has shown that with the right procedures in place companies can survive, and thrive, from anywhere in the world.”

Many corporate leaders who guided their companies through the Great Recession of 2008 are also successfully guiding their organizations through the global pandemic. One of those leaders is Roger Neel, Co-founder and CTO of Mavenlink, who sums up the unprecedented challenges for most organizations as a result of the pandemic crisis: “For better or worse, this period of uncertainty and major change is likely to make a lasting impact on the way different companies interact with one another and the ways in which organizations operate. With distributed teams, things like a lack of communication, security concerns, training and on-boarding challenges, and burnout are more pronounced. As remote work becomes more of a new normal, we’ll see these challenges rise up the priority ladder for organizations trying to grow and move forward in this new paradigm. How companies manage these challenges today will be very telling for their prospects tomorrow.”

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