Remote Working – Help your Business Attract and Keep Good People
By now, most companies have at least heard of remote working and may have even allowed some employees to work from home on occasion. What many companies have yet to embrace, though, is how a remote office environment can benefit them.
As your company thinks about making this move, consider these top seven benefits of remote working.
1.Happy Employees
First and foremost, a remote working system means happier employees. Job satisfaction rises when employees don’t feel micro-managed and feel their employers care about them as people. Increasingly, this means people with ever more complicated personal lives and priorities. And few workers in today’s generation see or feel the need to work in a cubicle eight hours a day, five days a week. Entire genres of comedy, in fact, poke fun at this antiquated work model. (Think Dilbert and “The Office.”) Allowing employees to work from home or wherever they have remote access shows your employees you value them. When employees feel valued, employees are happy and happy employees always leads to more productivity.
2. Recruit the Best
Tethering your business to an office means you must recruit workers from people already living in your market or those looking to move there. But you may not be able to recruit the best and brightest who don’t want to live in your city. The remote working and a remote office means you can recruit whoever best suits your company’s needs no matter where they live.
3. Easy Expansion
Don’t limit your growth because expansion costs too much. By utilizing a remote office environment, you can grow faster and more quickly because you don’t need to establish a “real” office where you wish to expand.
4. Flexibility
The traditional 40-hour work week doesn’t work anymore in the 21st century business world. It doesn’t work for employees and it certainly doesn’t work for your business either. A remote work environment gives you the freedom and flexibility to work with the ebb and flow of today’s business cycle. Sometimes, you may need to work more and take work home, on the road or to wherever you work best. Sometimes work slows down and you may only need to check in for a few hours each day. No matter your needs, remote capability allows you to react to your current business demands.
5. Boost Productivity
Employees who work remotely often report that they are more productive. They can focus more attention to the task on hand because there are fewer distractions such as coworkers and competing priorities.
6. Stimulate Creativity
Being away from the office can also boost creativity. A study by Indiana University and reported in “The Atlantic” shows that we get better at problem solving the more physically removed from the problem we are.
The flexibility of the remote office also allows employees more opportunities to rest their direct attention brain functions — those functions we employ when we focus directly on a task — and allow them to flex their indirect attention. In those times when employees enjoy a hobby, watch a kid’s soccer game or take a long weekend, those creative juices begin to flow as the brain is given time to rest, wander and problem solve.
7. Save Money
And of course there is always the benefit of the bottom line. Utilizing cloud computing saves money in tech support and hardware. Employees will be happier leading to reduced turnover, which costs money and manpower. You’ll even save on office costs such as power, heat and supplies. Remote working just makes sense!
With these benefits and more, companies should embrace the ways remote working allows them the freedom and flexibility to become leaders in the 21st century business environment.
