WFH vs Work from Office – What does the data suggest?
Over the past month, across our social media platforms, we’ve been mentioning inspiring company’s actions, reminding our readers not to forget about company culture, and focus on frontline support. Heck, we’ve also got a brand new look to our website!
Today we want to do something different though: we want to talk about some numbers and some considerations
We’ve been working from home for a while now and we need to take into account the fact that recently things have changed, and changed more than we imagined it would before the pandemic: remote working won’t go away. Quite the opposite, really: it looks like it is here to stay.
Zoom calls with colleagues. A homemade sandwich for lunch, and the kids within earshot. It’s hardly the workplace we expected, but guess what? It is our current reality now!
And if you’re wondering how’s the Workforce feeling about all of this, you’re in the right place.
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LinkedIn has recently published a series of research called the LinkedIn Workforce Confidence Index, analyzing how people feel about working remotely. Here’s what we found out.
First of all, 55% of respondents now think their industry can be effective when people are working remotely.
Optimism is strongest in intensely digital fields, such as software, finance, and media. In those industries, more than 75% of people endorse the idea that remote work and effective operations go hand in hand. It comes to no surprise: many of these jobs can be done from home and most of the companies in the above industries had already set up the right technology tools to implement remote working.
But what if a profession needs in-person interaction, all the time?
Let’s look at some examples: health care (48%) and manufacturing professionals (41%) feel ok with the idea of spending more time remote, while there’s a bit more resistance among retail workers, with only 29% of insiders thinking their industry could thrive with remote work. Again, this comes with no surprise: there’s still so much unknown in the realm of the post-pandemic shopping experience,
Taken as a whole, though, the new norms are also finding surprising support.
Even in “boots and bolts” industries, a majority of respondents now say remote work can play an effective role. Examples include hardware and networking (61%), energy and mining (61%), or transportation and logistics (52%).
The same is true for classic white-collar fields that have long been associated with big offices or classrooms, such as legal (67%), public administration (59%), and education (57%).
Ok, these percentages show the general sentiment amongst industries. But what about personal feelings? Are people really worried they can’t be as efficient as they want to be if they need to stay home?
Well, when professionals are asked if they personally can be effective in a remote work setting, they express even more optimism than when viewing their industry as a whole. Personal optimism on working from home effectively is running at 65%! This accounts for as much as 10 percentage points above professionals’ views on how effective their industry can be as a whole.
It also looks like top executives are rapidly getting the message. Dirk Van de Put, for example, told The Wall Street Journal that the crisis has shown that companies can work in different ways and that maybe humanity does not need all the offices it currently has around the world. Food for thought right here!
Along these lines, how can we forget to mention Twitter? Jack Dorsey decided earlier this month that even when offices formally reopen, individual employees will be able to decide how much if at all, they return to onsite work.
So, what are we learning from all of this? Well, the biggest takeaway here is that whether we like it or not, remote working across some industries has come into our lives sooner than expected,
It’s our opinion that across physical orientated industries (manufacturing, supply, haulage, construction et al) we will see physical distancing for some time to come and then a new wave of technology solutions to reassure workforces of their health and accuracy to measures to keep them safe. Which is only an incredibly exciting thing.
The biggest thing we hope for at Beem is there’s a shift in perception and attitude from corporate leadership to their front-line teams, that they’re not a faceless expendable resource but a proud, integral and effective section of an employee base which keeps companies viable; and that they will be welcomed further into the traditionally corporate fold
We cross our fingers, and time will tell