Sua empresa está pronta para trabalhar permanentemente em casa?

Is your company ready to permanently work from home?

Establishing a quick solution to manage social distancing requirements is different from creating a long-term remote work arrangement.

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SurveyMonkey and Zoom poll , the majority of workers (65%) stated that their ideal work scenario is to work both from home and in the office. About half of these people would prefer to work primarily from home. About 15% (out of 65%) said they would like to work entirely from home. This represents about 80% of workers who would like to work from home at least part of the time – a large majority.

Obviously, it's helpful to have this information to help you understand how people generally feel about working from home after the pandemic. But there are differences between workers in different areas and age groups. The best way to find out how your employees view the issue is to ask them.

Depending on the size of your company, you can create your own survey or interview workers individually. Ask them how the WFH arrangement has worked for them, whether they want to keep it, and what they would change if they could.

Did you overcome any important challenges?

Certainly, companies that adopted working from home for the first time in 2020 had some adjustments to make. For example, when employees worked in the office, it was obvious whether they were there or not and teams often measured productivity by the time they spent at their desks. But with remote work, many managers have learned that productivity can best be measured in the work produced.

Another challenge was the distractions remote work team members faced at home, especially if others in the family were also required to work or learn there. Employees may have had to establish new boundaries and schedules so they could be available when needed. Employers may have had to exercise patience and offer training or tools to help.

Workers who previously used the office environment to hold impromptu in-person meetings may have been hesitant to go remote. work tools do the same, thinking they might be bothering managers whose status they couldn't directly see. Creating “office hours” or using the presence feature of some apps helped solve this problem.

If your company was able to overcome the many challenges with an emergency WFH arrangement, chances are it can weather the trials of a permanent arrangement.

Have you identified ways that WFH has strengthened your company?

Even though the emergency WFH arrangement was challenging during 2020, it may have made your company stronger. If so, it's a good indication that continuing with such a deal would be a smart move. One way your company may have strengthened itself was by learning new ways to communicate. Perhaps a messaging app like Slack helped streamline conversations and reduce the need for meetings.

Other ways your company may have improved because of a WFH arrangement include better punctuality from those who could never make it to the 9 a.m. planning meeting, better self-care for employees who could use their previous commute time to exercise, and greater job satisfaction for people who like to be at home with family and pets.

The following video describes more reasons why working from home is good for business:

Are you ready to develop a WFH infrastructure?

Maybe you're living with temporary WFH rules, technologies, and policies. If your company decides to make WFH permanent, you'll need to create an infrastructure to manage these issues on an ongoing basis. For example, perhaps your employees have had to create makeshift offices in their homes with existing furniture. But a folding or dining chair is not ergonomic and can cause health problems over time.

You'll need to provide better furniture, replace routers, replace personal laptops with company laptops, and deliver supplies more consistently. You'll also need to create rules about who works from home, under what circumstances, and how often. Maybe you want employees to spend at least one day a week in the office or be available to attend all-hands meetings. You'll need to set all expectations in a general remote work plan.

Of particular importance in the plan should be communication guidelines, including how and how often to provide updates. Another important issue is standard operating procedures (SOPs) on how to manage data and documents. For example, where should team members store materials related to a specific project? Employees must also know which tools to use and for what purpose. Finally, what time are team members expected to be available?

If your company is prepared to think about all of these questions, it's a good sign that you're ready for a permanent WFH setup.

If you answered yes

If you answered yes to all of these questions, there's a good chance your company is ready for a permanent WFH arrangement. If not, that's okay! You might be ready after a few adjustments. And if it's just not a good fit, that's okay too. Your company has made it through this period and may look back fondly on remote work as something you're glad you no longer have to do.

Source: BairesDev

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