Significant numbers of employees have been working from home since the government announced the Covid-19 lockdown in March this year.  At the beginning of August employees were told that if possible they should start to return to work, leaving many anxious about this move.  However, just a few weeks later, following the surge in the number of infections, it has now been superseded by advice from government to, “work from home if you can.”  So where does this leave employers, particularly with recent reports that up to two thirds of office workers had returned to their normal place of work?

Working arrangements
Despite many employers being wary of staff working away from the office, the sudden exodus of staff to their living rooms and bedrooms that was forced upon them, has made some think twice about how work should be organised in future.  Some are still of the opinion that employees are not as productive as they might have been and want them back at work as soon as possible.  Others are looking at the possibilities of flexible working as a more permanent feature of their future workplace arrangements.

Temporary arrangements
The initial lockdown was announced so suddenly that the arrangements many employers put in place were only intended to be temporary.  But as the months have passed, businesses have started to think about what should happen next.

Normally to agree to a working from home arrangement, employers would need to make sure that they provided the proper equipment for staff to work permanently from a home office; undertake the appropriate health and safety assessments and ensure that data protection and insurance was in place.  They should also introduce new employment contracts to cover the change in normal working location including the right for an employer to visit etc.  But this was all done in such a rush, that a lot of this will have simply been forgotten, or put to one side as the expectation was that everyone would return to the office once this was, “all over.”

Productivity
There have been lots of anecdotal stories of employers being suspicious of employees working from home and monitoring how this is affecting their productivity.  To be fair, for those staff with children, many have struggled to fit in the home schooling required as well as undertake the demands of their roles. Employees have often then been working late into the night and at weekends to make up the time. This has disproportionately affected women, who according to surveys have borne the brunt of the home-schooling responsibilities, even in two-parent households where both parents have been working from home.  Support and understanding rather than micromanagement and monitoring would be more helpful in such situations.

Now that schools have reopened, this should not be such a problem, but where children are sent home to self-isolate following a positive Covid-19 case in their year group or “bubble,” the onus is back on the parents to juggle childcare and home-schooling again.

Acas recognises that this is a problem.  In their homeworking guidance, they say that it is not a substitute for suitable care arrangements.  Dependants need to be looked after by someone other than the employee when they are working and that, if necessary, care arrangements should be in place to cover the time when the employee is working.  Clearly the emergency arrangements are not sustainable in the longer-term.

However, according to widely reported surveys undertaken in July, 82% of employees who have been working from home said that they would like to continue to work from home more in the future.  Many indicated that it would cut down on their commuting time and would give them a better work-life balance.  Others have said that they have found they are more productive without interruptions from others in the office.

Pros and Cons
Working from home is not suitable for everyone.  If your employees are the sort of people who thrive from being with others, then isolating them is not going to bring out the best of them in regards to creativity or productivity.  They may also develop mental health issues as a result of this loneliness, so their managers would need to be trained to spot the issues and respond accordingly.  Bringing them back into the office would suit them better.

Similarly, if you need your people to work in teams, then providing them with some physical way of getting together rather than simply allowing them to use a videoconference facility or chat app is important.  You may not need to do that every day but consider perhaps one day a week for them all to be in the office together.

To some extent it will depend on the sort of job that an employee undertakes – whether that can be done from home.  It will also depend on the facilities the employee has at home.  If they have no dedicated area from which to work and are just balancing a laptop on their knees whilst sitting on a sofa, that is not going to be workable.  Remember that as an employer, you are just as responsible for their health, safety and welfare whilst they are working at home as you would be if they were working on your premises.

There will be practical implications for homeworkers regarding the cost of providing equipment and technology licences, but it will potentially reduce office rental costs.

New Challenges
Dealing with existing employees is one thing but having to manage employees remotely involves a different skill set from the ones used for traditional supervision.  Therefore, businesses must not forget the need to invest in training their managers to supervise their staff in the new environment.

Similarly, taking on new recruits to work from home will require some thought on how to manage the induction period and to ensure that the new staff feel part of their new company.  Be creative in how you tackle this and talk to a reputable HR Adviser for help and guidance.