After going through the COVID-19 pandemic, it is safe to say that we spent a majority of our time on our devices. We had to adjust very quickly to a way of life we had never used before for school, work and simply to keep in touch with each other. Suddenly, we were taking classes on Zoom and doing our jobs from home to somehow keep life moving forward. Now that we’re on the other side of the pandemic, it seems like more and more employees would rather work from home than go into an office. This shift isn’t such a bad thing, and companies would benefit a lot from shifting their companies towards a remote work environment.
Remote work can benefit both employers and employees. For employees, having this sort of flexibility gives them the chance to take care of their families and not have to commute long distances. On the other hand, companies can hire employees from a wider pool of applicants since proximity isn’t an issue. They also do not have to spend top dollar on expensive office spaces.
Of course, a challenge of remote work is the potential for becoming distracted. Having flexibility in a work-life balance is highly desirable, but if life begins taking all the attention away from work, remote work becomes just a way to slack off. Remote work also can’t replicate the kind of human connection that seeing people in person creates. Despite that, companies have been able to pivot and find solutions for these problems, such as using hybrid work-week models and programs like Zoom to communicate in real time.
America is a country where working long hours and neglecting a social life is considered what it takes to be successful. Since the pandemic began, the workforce has suffered greatly from burnout. Many employees became incredibly stressed from their jobs, especially essential workers, and started questioning why we don’t take more measures to reduce stress in the workplace. When we stumbled into remote work by accident, we may have found a healthier alternative. Remote work has the potential to reinvent the way we view a successful work environment, one that values the employee’s mental health and personal life and sees it as essential for productivity.
There are many voices in the working world that prefer the old way of doing things. However, it’s arguable that in five to ten years, current jobs will become obsolete and the workforce will be full of jobs that don’t even exist yet. With an incoming future such as that, we might as well start preparing for it by shifting our work environment away from the old ways. Remote work has proven to be a game-changer for the future of the workforce, and companies should embrace it.