Working from Home

[insite]

With the earlier , pre CV , expanding trend of working from home online now turbo charged due to the lock down there is a distinct possibility this will continue in many sectors well after the immediate crises has been mitigated or suppressed.

The attractions of this for companies / employers are apparent in the main whilst the implications both positive or negative are as yet far from clear.

It has been reported that in the UK property market presently there is already a considerable elevated level of interest in rural or small town property and one might think this could be for these reasons.

Should a trend such as this take hold it has vast implications for city commercial and residential property values , infrastructure and services development and employment this perhaps being but the tip of the iceberg.

Interesting days ahead methinks .

[hk blues]

1 hour ago, insite said:

With the earlier , pre CV , expanding trend of working from home online now turbo charged due to the lock down there is a distinct possibility this will continue in many sectors well after the immediate crises has been mitigated or suppressed.

The attractions of this for companies / employers are apparent in the main whilst the implications both positive or negative are as yet far from clear.

It has been reported that in the UK property market presently there is already a considerable elevated level of interest in rural or small town property and one might think this could be for these reasons.

Should a trend such as this take hold it has vast implications for city commercial and residential property values , infrastructure and services development and employment this perhaps being but the tip of the iceberg.

Interesting days ahead methinks .

I'm unconvinced that there will be a significant change to most worker's arrangements in the short term.  It was an interesting topic during lockdowns to pass the time but as soon as lockdowns are lifted the target is to get people back to working as before IMO.  

We'll see.

[Jollygoodfellow]

8 minutes ago, hk blues said:

I'm unconvinced that there will be a significant change to most worker's arrangements in the short term.  It was an interesting topic during lockdowns to pass the time but as soon as lockdowns are lifted the target is to get people back to working as before IMO.  

We'll see.

Depends I think. I live in a call center area and most are either working from home or not working at all. Some are  transported by bus or vans to work here. There is hardly anyone around since the quarantine began and if companies find it worked out fine for these agents to work from home it might continue which would affect other business here in the IT park such as food outlets.

Where my partner works they tried working from home only for a short time then was scrapped because of issues which l do not know.

If some companies found working from home was better then I guess it would work out cheaper in the long run, for a start they could downsize their office space and save a heap in rental.

[GeoffH]

If the companies can save money (like heating, cooling, rent, furniture and maintenance and still get similar productivity then I can see some heading that way.

[insite]

I have two friends running call centers here in Davao - both have staff working from home over the lockdown.

I discussed this matter with them - the first was reluctant to promote this practice in full when the time came to move back to an office mainly for issues relating to data protection and client confidentiality which was almost impossible to control adequately - however both saw benefits where issues such as these were not a concern.

With high speed fiber internet now widely available , apps such as Zoom and gadgets aplenty to monitor and control staff they thought the cost savings well worth consideration.

We will see indeed.

[Jack Peterson]

6 minutes ago, insite said:

the cost savings well worth consideration.

 My wife worked from Home for 3 weeks and it was a total disaster, she could not get a link to her office files and so did little in the end, + it totally disrupted the houseHold and cost us in data purchase. Good for the Company I guess but not at home,

 When they called it a day it cost her some 3 more weeks to catch up on the missed work and resulted in a fair bit of Overtime. Unpaid.

 As I said, a Total waste of time, and thoroughly ill though out but........................  

[insite]

Perhaps a badly organized company as the owners I am aware of found it , when bedded in , very cost and productivity efficient - the only concerns were those raised earlier - different strokes perhaps.

Both my wife's sisters are working from home for call centers and both they and their employers are presently at ease with the situation.

[Jollygoodfellow]

34 minutes ago, insite said:

Perhaps a badly organized company as the owners I am aware of found it , when bedded in , very cost and productivity efficient - the only concerns were those raised earlier - different strokes perhaps.

Both my wife's sisters are working from home for call centers and both they and their employers are presently at ease with the situation.

Not sure who you are replying to but anyway some have found it worthwhile.

Quote

PLDT

Hernandez said the past few months had been so transformational that the company is looking to implement remote working until the end of the year for most of its 17,000 employees – becoming the first publicly listed firm in the Philippines to do so. Organisational processes have been expedited and the length of meetings cut in half, he said, with the HR team now studying which departments can work from home for good.

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/economics/article/3087028/philippines-months-long-lockdown-forces-firms-embrace-remote

[graham59]

Working from home requires considerable self-discipline,  to sustain 'performance'.

Good luck to the companies thinking it will work for them.

In my experience,  a physically present whip-in-hand  supervisor is needed, if you plan on making a profit.  

[JJReyes]

Not all company operations can be done by "work at home" employees.  The most promising are backroom functions like accounting.  There are tremendous savings because downtown office rentals tend to be expensive.   Possibly some employees will attend a once a week meeting at the office and work from home the rest of the time.

The son of a close friend is with a large international management consulting firm.  Their system is empty cubicles at branch offices.  He reserves space for the number of days needed while visiting clients or working on a project.  The rest of the time, he works at home.