However, a new study by software company OSlash shows that remote work actually costs more than you might think. The report surveyed 800 remote workers and 200 business leaders. 

What you need to know…

• 35% of remote workers spend an average of 104 minutes per week watching TV when they should be working;
• More than 70% of respondents said they have more than one job and spend up to 16 hours a week at another job. 
• Hybrid working help to find the balance between freedom and profits

Office time for non-work-related activities 

The OSlash study shows that remote workers often engage in non-work-related activities during the working period, especially the new generation workers. These activities include streaming music, watching TV, cleaning, and exercising. 

35% of remote workers spend an average of 104 minutes per week watching TV when they should be working; 

About 38% of respondents spend an average of 76 minutes per week exercising during work hours. In fact, more than 70% of respondents said they have more than one job and spend up to 16 hours a week at another job. 

As a result, employees only work for a short working period, thus it has a bad impact on productivity. 

Paying extra high costs for remote work  

When employees do non-work-related activities during their office time, it must affect their productivity and will bring additional high costs to their employers. The reason is that workers need to work overtime due to low productivity, and companies have to pay overtime for these employees. 

According to the study, spending an average of 104 minutes a week watching TV when you should be working costs companies up to $2,251 per employee. And spending an average of 76 minutes per week exercising during work hours also costs their employers $1,651 per employee.  

Additionally, the study noted that these activities might cost employers up to thousands of dollars. 

Remote workers want more autonomy

A large part of the reasons why employees don’t want to return to the office is because of the freedom they already have. Working remotely gives them more control over their day-to-day work. 

• 28% said they would miss out on exercise if they went back to the office; 
• 28% said they would miss streaming music; 
• 26% said they would miss spending time with their families. 

If they were forced to return to work in an office, the ADP survey found that 64% of employees would consider leaving their current company for another. 

Employees who work from home value their better work-life balance and will not give it up easily.

Returning to the office would entail foregoing flexible hours and spending less time with their families. It might also mean spending more time commuting, sharing public restrooms, and working in quiet (or worse: having to listen to bad music).

Returning to the office may also result in less sleep, as remote workers can take an afternoon nap to increase their productivity.

These are some of the reasons why most remote workers are hesitant to give up their independence; 78% stated they would rather take a wage loss to stay from home than return to the office. Respondents from Generation Z were the most willing to do so.

By OSlash study, flexible scheduling is one of the strongest incentives to sway them back to the office.

Measures to encourage employees to return to the office 

Some organizations understand how expensive it is to recruit new talents, so 42% of business leaders are willing to increase salaries for non-remote workers, and 38 % even said they would offer travel allowances to attract employees to return to work in the office.  

The OSlash study notes that while remote work offers a relaxed work atmosphere, bosses need to take the risk of paying high costs and it is difficult to monitor. The result is there is still a certain necessity to return to the office.   

If you want your employees to return to the office, you must take some incentive measures to entice them back, and these measures must meet the needs of workers. 

According to the OSlash study, 

• 62% of leaders say they offer employees the flexible work hours they need; 
• 56% of leaders say they offer employees a hybrid work schedule that works for them; and 
• 35% would give employees extra vacation time. 

These leaders believe that hybrid work can improve productivity and provide employees with sufficient flexibility at work. In fact, many reports indicate that hybrid work is the best choice for the future of work. 

Finding the balance between freedom and profits

Remote employees may be able to retain some of the independence they like as more organizations experiment with hybrid work patterns and four-day workweeks.

With more employees back at work (even if not for the full nine-to-five), employers should see increased productivity, restoring a positive return on investment in their staff. Employees that have a better work-life balance are more productive, focused, and innovative at work. This leads to an increase in employer profits.

Moreover, if your office uses hybrid working, you can have a smaller workspace as office resources would be shared, so your rent will be reduced.

Using office management systems, such as hot desking and meeting room systems, can help to improve resource usage efficiency. Most business leaders are willing to implement office management systems in their hybrid offices. 

Advantages of implementing office management systems 

Users use the meeting room system to quickly check available rooms and make real-time reservations, and ensure their room is not double booked.

When a user is absent from a meeting, the sensor of the room notifies the system that the room is empty, and the system will auto-cancel the reservation and releases the vacant space. This prevents the resources from being wasted. 

ONES is one of the famous all-in-one smart office systems that can help you to easily implement hybrid working at ease. You can easily perform virtual meetings, desk hoteling, and digital office management with our Room Booking, Desk Booking, and Visitor Management features.   

Contact us: hello@ones.software, or visit ONES Software official website for more information: https://ones.software/.   

The post Remote work costs more than you thought  first appeared on ONEs Blog.

In the post-pandemic era, lots of leaders express that they have “productivity paranoia”, and find it highly challenging to have faith in their workers’ productivity due to the transition to hybrid work.

Would there be some way that can help to relieve these kinds of “productivity paranoia” for the decision-makers? This latest research from a Standford economist of WFH Research could help.

Why does hybrid working still stay?

This research “The Future of WFH” from Standford started in 2004. Currently monthly surveys of 10,000 US working-age adults and 1,000 US firms and discussion and consulting with 100s of organizations globally.

Based on this research, there are several benefits of hybrid working explain why this is becoming dominant:

Employees are happier

Employee value of a hybrid work environment is comparable to their value of an 8% salary raise. This indicates that even if their company offered them almost 10% more money to go back to work full-time, they would choose a hybrid policy—or to keep the one they now have.

Retain talents

Referring to the paper “How Hybrid Working From Home Works Out“, marketing and finance professionals found WFH reduced quit rates by 35%.

(Learn more about how hybrid working retain talent: GitLab: Flexibility is critical for retaining IT talent now)

Productivity is increased

Paper “How Hybrid Working From Home Works Out“, natural experiments and survey research suggest a small productivity boost from WFH of around 3% to 5%

(Learn more: What is Employee Productivity and how does it relate to Hybrid Working now?)

Supports diversity, equity, and inclusion

Data suggests that Hybrid-WFH can help support diversity in various dimensions, like 86% of Latinx / Hispanic, 81% of Asian/ Asian American and Black would prefer a hybrid of full remote work arrangement.

Hints about Hybrid WFH

Employees desire both autonomy and coordination

Decision-makers may struggle between providing enough flexibility to workers and maintaining coordination within the working group.

Based on the survey, actually employees desire both autonomy and coordination: 69.9% of people prefer being able to choose which days can work from home, while 75.6% of them would like their employers to set a policy that determines who works from home on which days.

Who decides which days and how many days employees work remotely? Based on the research, firms with 250+ employees would determine at the team level or by company. For smaller firms with less than 25 employees, the remote work pattern will be declined to be fully decentralized.

Number of days for WFH

Survey also questioned, “As the pandemic ends, how often would you like to have paid workdays at home? For each day last week, did you work a full day (6 or more hours), and if so where”.

Based on the responses to the question, only 16.3% of respondents would prefer rarely or never WFH after the COVID-19 pandemic, and most of them (83.7%) would like to have more than 1 day that can work from home.

Social capital: the benefit of working in the office

For asking about the top 3 benefits of working on an employer’s business premises, the employees answer as follows:

1. Face-to-face collaboration (54.8%)
2. Socializing (54.0%)
3. Work/personal life boundaries (44.4%)

Employees would like to come back to the office for 1 hour for communicating with colleagues, not for free bagels and drinks.

Action can be made for the most of Hybrid WFH

Stanford economist Nick Bloom stated some actions leaders can make the most of Hybrid WFH which can set culture to achieve “office time = group social time“:

1. Coordinate your team to come in on the same 2 or 3 days every week
2. Promote in-person meetings, events, coffee, training, and lunches on those office days
3. Suggest cross-office zoom meetings and reading, writing, data, etc on home days
4. For new hires (< 1 or 2 years), add an extra day in the office for mentoring

Learn more about productivity in the hybrid working era: https://ones.software/blog/?s=Productivity+

Develop your own hybrid office with our smart office system: https://ones.software/

The post Latest Stanford research reveals successful management strategies on Hybrid WFH first appeared on ONEs Blog.