Is it really possible to work from home and be productive at the same time?
Many companies resist the idea of letting their employees work from home because of its bad reputation. A lot of people believe that working from home is just a means to escape hard work by being out of sight from the management’s watchful eyes. Some say that working from home makes an employee less productive as distractions and temptations are found in every corner of their house.
But apparently, a two-year study carried out by a company in Singapore says otherwise. Stanford Professor of Economics Nicholas Bloom during his TED Talk revealed that working from home can be as “powerful and innovative as the driverless car”.
In the study, a Singapore company made half of its staff work from home for four days a week. Meanwhile, the other half were made to report to the office five days a week.
Results showed that those who worked from home experienced “massive, massive” increase in productivity. In fact, their productivity was equivalent to an additional workday mainly because of lesser distractions and nonsense conversations.
Additionally, employees who worked from home had the tendency to stay in their jobs longer and thus, decreasing employee turnover. As a result, management productivity becomes higher while expenses for loss of skills and connection when an employee resigns is reduced.
Work-from-home employees were also found to be happier and healthier decreasing the company’s overall health care expenses.
Because of the results of the experiment, the company then instituted work-from-home throughout the entire company. As a side benefit of this decision, the company was able to grow without adding office space that entails additional cost.
-- Mini, The Summit Express
Many companies resist the idea of letting their employees work from home because of its bad reputation. A lot of people believe that working from home is just a means to escape hard work by being out of sight from the management’s watchful eyes. Some say that working from home makes an employee less productive as distractions and temptations are found in every corner of their house.
But apparently, a two-year study carried out by a company in Singapore says otherwise. Stanford Professor of Economics Nicholas Bloom during his TED Talk revealed that working from home can be as “powerful and innovative as the driverless car”.
In the study, a Singapore company made half of its staff work from home for four days a week. Meanwhile, the other half were made to report to the office five days a week.
Results showed that those who worked from home experienced “massive, massive” increase in productivity. In fact, their productivity was equivalent to an additional workday mainly because of lesser distractions and nonsense conversations.
Additionally, employees who worked from home had the tendency to stay in their jobs longer and thus, decreasing employee turnover. As a result, management productivity becomes higher while expenses for loss of skills and connection when an employee resigns is reduced.
Work-from-home employees were also found to be happier and healthier decreasing the company’s overall health care expenses.
Because of the results of the experiment, the company then instituted work-from-home throughout the entire company. As a side benefit of this decision, the company was able to grow without adding office space that entails additional cost.
-- Mini, The Summit Express
