Working remotely is becoming more and more common day by day. Most companies tend to focus on making the home more optimized as an office space. But there’s more to it than that. Employee engagement is another aspect which can increase the productivity of an individual while working from home. It is not only essential to make sure a person is equipped properly for working from home, it is also important to make the individual more engaged.
The remote work boom
Last year, i.e. in 2020 it became mandatory for professionals across various fields to work remotely. Remote working became the norm during the lockdown months and thus, the concept became more widely known and more familiar with professionals. Even though the popularity of working from home skyrocketed during the lockdown months, it was not the first time that this concept was introduced. Working remotely is something that has been happening for a little more than the last ten years. If you look online you’ll find that 43 out of 100 people had done work from home occasionally. This data is for the year 2016.
So, it can very well be understood that a lot of people are working from home and thus, this matter requires to be reflected on. But you’ll find that home office optimization discussions do not go beyond the ergonomics of the workspace.
Optimization of the workspace, 3 techniques:
The ergonomics of a workspace is indeed an important topic. Optimization of your home office must take into account the ergonomics factors like maintaining the right posture, not doing anything repetitively and lessening the stress on body and mind. But the concept should not stop at that only. The concept of remote work and other concepts regarding remote work are changing day by day. Newer concepts are also being introduced. It is no longer solely about the workspace at home or the home itself. It should now take into account how to increase the engagement level of the employees, how to ensure more efficiency, how to increase productivity, etc.
One of the main things that employees working from home find it difficult to deal with is the daily routine. Since they’re working from home, it becomes hard to distinguish between family time and work time. This inability to make a distinction results in the employee getting distracted.
- Prepare– It is recommended that before its office time, you should prepare for office as if you were actually going to office. Eat your breakfast, get dressed and be there at the workspace at the proper time. Doing this would be able to get you in your work mindset.
- Behavioral problems– You should also take care of your behavioral issues. Being there at home, makes you care less about discipline and you start taking more breaks. You may start browsing on the internet more. Taking breaks more often include going out for any other tasks, etc.
- Facilities and equipments– Oftentimes, it is not possible to get all the facilities one gets at office at home. If you’re comfortable with the set up you have at office then working on a different set up at home can be challenging.
Another way to increase productivity in a remote workspace is to make sure that the employees have microphones and webcams and video conferencing software to help increase communication between the employees.
Increasing the engagement level of employees is one of the areas where employers must work on to ensure maximum productivity.
- People working from home can rightly make the claim that they feel alone while they’re working. They feel like being isolated. But these two problems can be dealt with from the employer’s end very easily. Just chatting or interacting more with the employees can help. Care should be taken so that the employees feel like they belong, and increase their level of enthusiasm. All these can increase the productivity.
- Employee engagement will also increase if the balance between work and life is maintained. Providing discretionary money to employees so that they’re able to take a break from their work life and enjoy some quality time with their loved ones. This is also important for increasing productivity.
Workspace optimization includes a lot more than the environment and the equipments that are used. Talking, making it all a little more inclusive and being flexible are very important in this regard.
