One thing that rolled out to be a good thing in 2020 was the feasibility of working from home. Covid-19 has changed the perception of employers and employees. It has changed the way we look at work. While the rest of the world was fighting this deadly pandemic, the corporate sector has carved its way and successfully managed to continue operating and remain afloat. Thanks to its work-from-home scheme.
However, remote working has come along with its challenges. From bringing employees together from different locations to managing each employee, it has become a hell of a task for managers to handle everything. Therefore, in this article, We'll go into what a work from home policy is and what you need to put in one for your organization to help you out.
What is a work-from-home scheme?
The work-from-home scheme is also known as a remote work policy or telecommuting policy. It can be defined as the contract between an employer and an employee that specifies the collection of agreed-upon rules and guidelines for employees working from home.
What to include in your work from the home Policy?
Since the rapid shift to working from home has compelled businesses to rethink their strategies, here's what you can include in yours to ensure that your policy achieves better outcomes while minimizing risks.
1- Which Employee is eligible to work from home?
Every work has its own set of requirements. Likewise, not all jobs can be performed by working from home. Set a precise layout that defines which employees can work from home and which ones have to be in the office. Also, while keeping duties in mind, make sure to understand the employee's efficiency of working from home. Analyze which employee can give their best while working from home and plan accordingly.
2- Monitoring Performances Of Employees
As for the sake of security purposes, many organizations rely on monitoring tools to monitor and track employee's activity and performance. Therefore all the details regarding the things that will get monitored should be stated in the policy.
3- Virtual IT assistance
Technical issues are unavoidable while working at the office, and we cannot run away from them while working from home either. However, it is easy to solve the issues when working from the office as it gets resolved quickly with the help of the IT support team. But it gets tricky to solve these issues virtually. Therefore, technical support with the help of tools that allow remote access to an employee's computer can be a beneficial idea.
4- Introduce regular working hours
Your work-from-home policy should include a clear layout of when your employees need to log in and log out, as well as how many breaks are allowed with the specified time limit, to ensure your employees are not taking an extra break and logging in late. If your company allows flexible scheduling of work, make sure to set a total number of working hours.
5- Attendance and regular updates of employees
The remote worker's availability expectations must be outlined in the work from home policy. Apart from that, keeping track of employees' work along with their attendance can be a bit challenging while working virtually. However, regular updates of their work at a specific time can get your employee's input with much ease.
Benefits of Working from Home
Work from home brings along endless benefits. Some of them are stated below.
1- Increased Productivity:
When discussing the advantages of working from home, the increase in employee's productivity is always at the top of the list. Employees are much more productive because they have more freedom and less chaos than when they work from the office.
2- Work-life Balance
Work-life balance has taken a quick turn after employees started working from home. It allows employees to save extra time, as there's no office distraction, no annoying co-workers. Employees are now much more focused and leading to better physical and mental health.
3- Hire the best in the world
As there's no limitation of hiring from the same town, employers can hire the best talent globally. With the current advancements in technologies, it is easier to hire employees across the globe with no compromises.
4- Less Absenteeism
Remote working is the best approach to decrease the number of absent days. It allows employees to take care of themself and also get their work done. As a result, the team is happier and more efficient.
Also Watch: How To Manage Employee Attendance Using EmpMonitor? | EmpMonitor How-To Series
Wrapping It Up
Work From Home policy can give your employees the support they need to perform. It can assist your company in determining the issues and solving them that come along with remote working. Include these points on your company policies and allow your company to soar to new heights.
