‘Remote work leads to savings, rise in productivity, but there are cons too’

The continuation of the work-from-home option, which was implemented during the pandemic, has led to a significant reduction in commute time and costs of employees, given them flexibility to live in more affordable areas, reduced the pressure of high rental costs, and freed them to schedule work and rest according to their personal needs, a study has found.

It, however, maintained that remote working has led to a difficulty in separating work and personal life, leading to increased employee stress as many employees lack dedicated, undisturbed workspaces at home.

Furthermore, flexibility in scheduling can be considerably problematic for those unable to maintain self-discipline.

The study titled “WFH in the Indian context” was conducted by the Confederation of Indian Industry and the Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi University. It was released on Monday.

In total, 117 responses were received, of which two were incomplete and hence excluded from the study. The respondents represented companies operating in a variety of sectors such as technology and IT, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, manufacturing and industrial, consulting and professional services.

In terms of annual turnover, 30.5% of the companies which were part of the study had an annual turnover in the range of Rs. 1 lakh to Rs. 10 crore, while nearly half (49.6%) had a turnover of more than Rs. 500 crore. By number of employees, 30.4% of the companies reported having employees in the range of 1-100, while 53% had more than 1,000 employees.

Savings for employers

Meanwhile, employers noted that remote working has led to substantial savings in office rental costs and reduced expenses related to meetings with clients and internal meeting. It also enabled significant reduction in commuting stress for employees, leading to greater energy levels and increased employee productivity.

On the other hand, it has also resulted in less effective communication, which is detrimental to teamwork.

“Remote working has led to a significant shift towards performance-based monitoring and increased reliance on trust has become greatly necessary to ensure employee performance,” the study noted.