Advantages and Disadvantages of Remote Working

Verified

Added on  2022/11/29

|13
|3370
|255
AI Summary
Read More
tabler-icon-diamond-filled.svg

Contribute Materials

Your contribution can guide someone’s learning journey. Share your documents today.
Document Page
Running Head: Writing Intensive
WRITING INTENSIVE
tabler-icon-diamond-filled.svg

Secure Best Marks with AI Grader

Need help grading? Try our AI Grader for instant feedback on your assignments.
Document Page
2
Writing Intensive
Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................................... 3
ADVANTAGES OF REMOTE WORK.....................................................................................4
DISADVANTAGES OF REMOTE WORK...............................................................................6
BEST PRACTICES FOR IMPLEMENTING REMOTE-WORK OPPORTUNITIES..................9
RECOMMENDATION TO THE COMPANY..........................................................................10
REFERENCES.....................................................................................................................12
Document Page
3
Writing Intensive
INTRODUCTION
General background
Remote working has become one of the common terms in all over the world as
companies are focusing on this aspect to save expense of physical expansion of the
company. Industries of many countries are offering telecommunication system and remote
working facilities to employees.
Historical information
Remote working has become more common worldwide with the passage of time. For
example, near about 400 employees had been allowed for working remotely from the year
1990 to the year 1992 in Los Angeles. It has been expected that remote working can help to
increase productivity (Highspeedinternet.com, 2019). In 2016, more than 40% of employees
are getting opportunities to work remotely in Los Angeles.
Definitions
Remote working refers to working in separate location apart from physical office
building of organization.
Remote workers can be defined as employees, who can work from their home and
communicate with the management of companies by using telecommunication system.
Explanations
Remote working helps to hire huge workforce without expanding physical boundary
of organization. Remote employees maintain connection with companies with the help of
telecommunication system. This study is focusing on analyzing both benefits and drawbacks
of remote working. Best practice to implement this working system can be identified with the
help of statistical information.
Trend information
More people are indulging in remote working and it is estimated that by 2027 majority
of workforce will work remotely. As per the report of Linkedin's global talent trends in 2019,
Document Page
4
Writing Intensive
72% of professionals have agreed work flexibility will be important for HR and sales jobs
(Remoteyear.com, 2019). Hence, remote working needs to be increased.
ADVANTAGES OF REMOTE WORK
Employers
Remote working helps employers in increasing their productivity and working
hours. Different remote working process like telecommuting can help employers to increase
flexibility in working and helps them to reduce the break period. As opined by Keeling
Clements-Croome & Roesch (2015), workers achieve more time to complete their projects
and focus on a project increases. Global workplace analytics survey regarding cost and
benefits shows that remote workers of large organization are 35 to 40% more productive
than its office counterparts (Remoteyear.com, 2019). Hence, remote working is more
productive than employing direct employees.
Moreover, cost savings is another essential advantage to employers that helps in
improving performance of the organization. No direct cost like office expenses is involved in
remote working. As stated by Bakewell et al. (2018), remote workers pay for their own
computers, electricity and other facilities that help in performing a task. For example, IBM
has successfully managed $50 million real estate costs by remote working
(Remoteyear.com, 2019). Expansion of talent pool is another important benefit to
employers that can help this firm mentioned in case study to achieve competitive advantage.
Employers can freely hire the best employees irrespective of geographical location. In
addition, retention of employees also increases and replacement costs get reduced.
Replacement of employees costs huge for employers that involve costs for recruiting,
training the new employees.
Employees
Employees also enjoy certain benefits of remote working that helps them to give
more focus on work. This helps to improve the quality of the performance and organization
achieves competitive advantage. Work-life balance is the main advantage of remote
tabler-icon-diamond-filled.svg

Secure Best Marks with AI Grader

Need help grading? Try our AI Grader for instant feedback on your assignments.
Document Page
5
Writing Intensive
working that helps employees to regain their life. They can avoid tough schedule of office
hours and work freely without any strict policy (Nijp et al. 2016). Flexible working
arrangements help employees to manage a good balance between work and life. Recent
report shows that better mental and physical health can be achieved through remote working
by reducing stress and burnout. A recent report given by flexjobs in 2018, it can be seen that
97% of 3000 respondents have stated that huge improvement has occurred in overall quality
of life due to remote working (Remoteyear.com, 2019). In addition, remote working also
helps in reducing the level of stress of an employee who works remotely. Busy schedule of
office, strict policies and huge pressure of work in shorter deadlines create high level of
mental stress and physical problems. Remote working helps employees to maintain a
healthier lifestyle and they obtain enough time to eat and conduct different exercises. Higher
level of stress causes different chronic diseases to employees like diabetes mellitus that
decreases their working abilities. Hence, remote working can be the best solution to
decrease stress level of employees.
Ability to work remotely removes commuting that can create intense stress before
starting work. In addition, removal of commuting helps employees to save money. It can be
seen that employees spend a part of their salary in commuting that decreases their
satisfaction rate (Spreitzer, Cameron & Garrett, 2017). Ability of remote working decreases
this problem and they can save costs of commuting that can help to increase their budget on
other activities like maintaining a proper diet. Expenses happen in commuting involves
parking, gas, public transport costs and other expenses related to transportation.
Ownership is another essential advantage of remote working that helps employees to be
their own boss. As mentioned by Bentley et al.(2016), remote working helps employees to
structure their work schedule as per their wish. Less or no monitoring happens in remote
working that helps to increase job satisfaction of employees. They can work freely and take
independent decisions regarding conducting a project.
Environment/Society
Document Page
6
Writing Intensive
Remote working does not only benefits employers and employees, rather it has a
significant impact on the environment and society. Less transportation is required when an
employee works from home and thus it reduces the rate of carbon emission that occurs
while using vehicles. It was found from research that even working outside the office for half
a week, employees can decrease greenhouse gas emissions by 54 million tonnes a year.
Moreover, different other resources that are intensely used in an office premise like paper,
air conditioner, electricity also gets cuts down. Hence, the environment can get benefited by
the incorporation of remote working and essential resources like trees can be saved. Rate of
pollution also decreases that occurs by the emission of greenhouse gases from air
conditioner and private vehicles.
Remote working has its benefits in society as older generations can be kept in a workforce.
Remote working can help to reduce competition in the workplace and older generation of
employees can be given a chance to work for longer periods of time. Hence, variation in
workforce can be achieved by having both experience and youth in a workforce. General
health of the society can also increase by incorporating remote working. Employees can
obtain enough time to think and spend on improving their health. Conducting exercises and
maintaining a strict diet requires time and money that can be achieved through remote
working.
Others (families)
Families of employees also face problems as less or no interaction occurs due to
huge work pressure. This increases stress level of employees and the relationship between
employees and their families decreases. Huge, work pressure, busy schedule, tiredness due
to work pressures decreases communication between employees and their families
(Bakewell et al. 2018). Remote working can help an employee to design the work schedule
as per their wish. Hence, better attachment can be established with family and this, in turn,
can help to reduce stress levels. Spending more time with family increases attachment
between members and acts as a great healer of mental depression.
Document Page
7
Writing Intensive
DISADVANTAGES OF REMOTE WORK
Employers
Employers face many difficulties while arranging remote working. Firstly, lack of
face-to-face interaction is a disadvantage of remote working. According to Keeling,
Clements-Croome & Roesch (2015), employers are bound to rely on their communication
mediums and there are no other alternatives to interact with remote workers directly. This
aspect limits the communication between employers and employees. It can be said that
there is a higher chance of error in delivery of service or goods to the customers. Secondly,
employers of companies face difficulties in maintaining and managing employees.
Management fails to monitor whether their remote employees are providing their best effort
or not. It becomes hard to monitor deliverables of remote employees. It means that
controlling remote employees become difficult for employers as they are working far away
from them. Thirdly, employers fail to evaluate the performance of remote workers
properly and it affects performance of business. As opined by Nijp et al. (2016), it is difficult
to evaluate the performance of remote workers as employers cannot have all information
regarding the circumstances in which the workers are performing their duties. However,
employers are trying to overcome these difficulties and offering remote working facilities to
their employees. For example, despite all these difficulties, Los Angeles is experiencing
overall boom in the area of virtual working. In 2017, more than 40% of workers of Los
Angeles have got opportunity to choose telecommunication and working from home facility
from their employers (Dailybreeze.com, 2019).
Employees
Employees experience difficulties when they choose the option of remote working. As
per the record, approximately 4.8% of total working people of the South Bay of Los Angeles
have chosen the telecommunication system and work from home facility in 2016
(Dailybreeze.com, 2019). Remote working leads to lower morale in employees as they
feel isolated. As they work far from the company, they feel that they are isolated and they get
limited information regarding business process of the company. Often remote employees
tabler-icon-diamond-filled.svg

Paraphrase This Document

Need a fresh take? Get an instant paraphrase of this document with our AI Paraphraser
Document Page
8
Writing Intensive
fail to understand the perspective of management due to lack of transparency between the
company and remote workers. Decreasing level of employee visibility within companies is
one of the important drawbacks of remote working. Employees feel that they can lose the
opportunity of promotion as their performance is not being monitored by their hierarchy.
Remote workers face difficulties to maintain balance between personal and
professional life. As they are not bound by any working hour system, they try to spend
most of their time to focus on work. It becomes difficult for them to spend time with their
friends and families. Remote workers face difficulties to focus on the work many times as
they are not being monitored. Increasing distraction is one of the main difficulties faced by
remote workers in their daily life. According to Spreitzer, Cameron & Garrett (2017), remote
workers get distracted by their family members, surrounding environment and other
entertainment opportunities. Due to this reason, many remote employees fail to provide their
best effort to work.
Managers
Managers of companies that ensure remote working, face many difficulties to
manage remote workers. However, many organizations are focusing on remote working as it
is less expensive than physical expansion of company. For example, California has become
one of the 50 states that are promoting remote working and many companies of this place
are offering remote working facilities to their employees for saving expense of physical
expansion (Virtualvocations.com, 2019). Due to this reason, managers are being assigned
with responsibilities of managing huge remote workforce. Firstly, they fail to monitor
performance of remote employees due to physical distance. They are responsible for
getting the work done within deadline and the cannot do anything but rely on the ability of
remote employees. On another hand, Bentley et al.(2016) have mentioned that managers
face pressure from the employers to ensure quality jobs are done within deadline. It
becomes difficult for managers to satisfy the expectations of both employers and remote
employees. As most of the company does not bound remote workers within specific working
hours, they work any time of their choice. In those cases, managers are forced to spend
Document Page
9
Writing Intensive
almost the entire day to manage remote working. This aspect prevents managers to
maintain a balance between professional and personal life. Managers of companies that
operate remote working are responsible to be available at any time of the day for
management of remote working.
Teams
Remote working teams often face communication issues and this problem affects
their performance. Lack of communication between team members creates difficulties for
remote workers to understand the perspective of each other. They use telecommunication
system to be connected with each other. However, extreme use of this system prevents
them to focus on the work and they fail to provide their best effort to their jobs. As mentioned
by Bakewell et al.(2018), remote employees fail to develop good working relationships with
their co-workers due to limited conversation between them.
Others (Customers)
Organizations focus on remote working to lower their expense of physical expansion.
However, employers, employees, and managers face many difficulties due to the limited
options for communication. In many cases, companies fail to deliver products or services
within promised deadlines to customers. Many organizations fail to meet the
expectations of customers regarding quality of service or product delivered by their
remote workers.
BEST PRACTICES FOR IMPLEMENTING REMOTE-WORK OPPORTUNITIES
Interviewing and hiring employees by considering essential skills
Different essential skills like telecommunication, tech-savvy, problem-solving and
organization skills are essential for a remote worker. Hence, remote work practices can be
implemented by considering these essential skills, which can help to increase productivity of
a firm. Moreover, during interview self-motivation of employees and ethics level needs to be
tested. This can help to measure the ability of an employee to work in a proper way through
Document Page
10
Writing Intensive
telecommuting. Time management skill of a remote worker must be measured that can help
to maintain flexibility in work.
Delivering training that is specific to work remotely
This is an essential practice that helps an organization to increase the level of remote
working abilities. Arrangement of specific training that is related to remote working can help
employers to increase skills and abilities of remote workers. Different training regarding
improving skills like time management and organizing can be arranged by employers. It can
be seen that 21% of employees feel lonely while working remotely. 13% of remote workers
have faced problems regarding managing time due to different time zones. In addition, 14%
of remote workers stated that they lack motivation and gets distracted during working from
home (Jobbatical.com, 2019). Hence, this states the importance of this activity that can help
employers to organize an effective remote workforce.
Making strong foundational policies
For implementing remote work opportunities, another best practice is framing effective
policies. Without proper policies, less or control can be exerted to the remote workers. As
opined by Spreitzer, Cameron & Garrett (2017), designing flexible and remote work policies
creates an advantage in implementing remote work. Before implementation of remote work,
it is essential to develop and design core policies of the organization. This firm can develop
policies regarding sales and other code of conduct that can eliminate any issues in future.
RECOMMENDATION TO THE COMPANY
This company can implement some strategy that can help them to manage the
remote workforce in a proper way and greater control can be exerted to them.
Maintaining a daily routine
Creation of an effective daily routine can be done by this firm of Los Angeles by
consulting with remote workers. Maintaining a record of their working time and daily
schedule can help in better communication between employees and management of this
tabler-icon-diamond-filled.svg

Secure Best Marks with AI Grader

Need help grading? Try our AI Grader for instant feedback on your assignments.
Document Page
11
Writing Intensive
company. Daily routine and working schedule will vary with respect to workers. Hence,
record should be kept by the management for achieving better results.
Communication
The company needs to maintain regular communication for achieving regular updates of
allocated tasks. This can be done through official portal or by the help of social media like
Skype. Regular communication with remote workers can also help to increase their
attachment with the organization. In addition, regular communication can also help to
decrease distraction of employees and help to increase their motivation.
Document Page
12
Writing Intensive
REFERENCES
Bakewell, L. L., Vasileiou, K., Long, K. S., Atkinson, M., Rice, H., Barreto, M., ... & Vines, J.
(2018, April). Everything we do, everything we press: Data-driven remote
performance management in a mobile workplace. In Proceedings of the 2018 CHI
Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (p. 371). ACM. Retrieved
from:http://delivery.acm.org/10.1145/3180000/3173945/paper371.pdf?
ip=47.15.247.71&id=3173945&acc=OA&key=4D4702B0C3E38B35%2E4D4702B0C
3E38B35%2E4D4702B0C3E38B35%2EBF7B5F4428810941&__acm__=156142590
9_badb8fa91792dd6782a19dc115a1b15d
Bentley, T. A., Teo, S. T. T., McLeod, L., Tan, F., Bosua, R., & Gloet, M. (2016). The role of
organizational support in teleworker wellbeing: A socio-technical systems approach.
Applied Ergonomics, 52, 207-215. Retrieved
from:https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Stephen_Teo/publication/
281137230_The_role_of_organisational_support_in_teleworker_wellbeing_A_socio-
technical_systems_approach/links/5a5ee0d70f7e9b4f783bb909/The-role-of-
organisational-support-in-teleworker-wellbeing-A-socio-technical-systems-
approach.pdf
Dailybreeze.com, (2019). Despite overall boom in L.A. telecommuters, South Bay
employees still not working remotely. Here’s what one study has found. Retrieved on
22nd June, 2019 from:https://www.dailybreeze.com/2019/01/15/despite-overall-boom-
in-l-a-telecommuters-south-bay-employees-still-not-working-remotely-heres-what-
one-study-has-found/
Highspeedinternet.com. (2019). The Digital Nomad: A Brief History of Remote Workers.
Retrieved on 22nd June, 2019
from:https://www.highspeedinternet.com/resources/history-remote-workers
Document Page
13
Writing Intensive
Jobbatical.com (2019), 6 Tips for Training a Remote Workforce.retrieved on 23rd June 2019
from:https://jobbatical.com/blog/a-comprehensive-guide-for-training-your-remote-
staff/
Keeling, T., Clements-Croome, D., & Roesch, E. (2015). The effect of agile workspace and
remote working on experiences of privacy, crowding and satisfaction. Buildings, 5(3),
880-898. Retrieved from: https://www.mdpi.com/2075-5309/5/3/880/pdf
Nijp, H. H., Beckers, D. G., van de Voorde, K., Geurts, S. A., & Kompier, M. A. (2016).
Effects of new ways of working on work hours and work location, health and job-
related outcomes. Chronobiology international, 33(6), 604-618. Retrieved
from:https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.3109/07420528.2016.1167731
Remoteyear.com (2019), Statistics, retrieved on 23rd June 2019 from:
https://remoteyear.com/blog/10-remote-work-statistics-you-should-know-about
Spreitzer,
G. M., Cameron, L., & Garrett, L. (2017). Alternative work arrangements:
Two images of the new world of work. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and
Organizational Behavior, 4, 473-499. Retrieved
from:https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-032516-
113332
Virtualvocations.com, 2019). California Telecommuting: 15 “Golden State” Remote
Employers. Retrieved on 22nd June, 2019
from:https://www.virtualvocations.com/blog/telecommuting-job-search-help/california-
telecommuting-15-remote-employers/
chevron_up_icon
1 out of 13
circle_padding
hide_on_mobile
zoom_out_icon
logo.png

Your All-in-One AI-Powered Toolkit for Academic Success.

Available 24*7 on WhatsApp / Email

[object Object]