Search Results for: remote working

Almost half of UK workers now work remotely for half the time, claims poll

by • Flexible working, Knowledge, News

Remote WorkingA new poll of 4,000 UK workers by Regus claims that 42 percent of respondents now work remotely from their main place of work for at least half the week. The proportion is up from 39 percent last year with employers citing improved productivity, increased staff retention and autonomy as well as lower operating costs as their main drivers for encouraging its uptake. However the research also suggests that many firms are slow to address the associated management challenges with half of those polled saying that managers do not trust them to remain focused on work. Only a quarter of firms have a system that allows managers to monitor remote teams while a third of managers now use video calls.

UK employers are global leaders in flexible working and secure BYOD policies

by • Facilities management, Knowledge, News, Technology, Workplace

 

The UK’s small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) lead the world in flexible working and ensuring staff work securely in the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) era, with 34 per cent saying they have policies, procedures and/or IT systems in place to manage the use of personal communications devices for business purposes. This compares to an average of 28 per cent in Europe and the rest of the world, and only 19 per cent in the US. This is not before time, as the global survey by YouGov of senior executives and managers in more than 1,250 small and medium businesses across Europe, North America and Australia on behalf of Citrix, found that nearly half of UK employees now routinely use personal devices at work.

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Flexible working boosts employee satisfaction and lowers business costs

by • Comment, Knowledge, Technology, Workplace

Working while commuting is on the increase survey finds

May 2013 played host to Work Wise Week, an initiative from Work Wise UK that aimed to promote and encourage smarter working practices to the benefit of businesses and employees. Cultural, economic and social changes are affecting attitudes to how we balance work and personal lives, and increasingly, mobility and technology is shifting away the need for the traditional 9-5 work patterns, replacing it with more flexible working practices. There are many benefits of flexible working and, as such, we are seeing more businesses starting to understand that forcing employees to work in an office does not guarantee productivity. (more…)

Majority of employers support flexible working but perception problems persist

by • Knowledge, Legal news, News, Workplace

flexible work

As we reported last week, the Millennial generation of workers born in the 80s and 90s would describe work as a “thing rather than a place”, and want more flexibility in where and how they work. While the Yahoo home working ban debate uncovered a lot of exasperation and suspicion towards this trend, it’s interesting to see two separate studies, from the UK and the U.S. that show a far less combative attitude. But, as the U.S study discovered, while a majority of employees enjoyed real productivity benefits from home working, nearly half would still go into the office because it is what is expected of them and a small percentage still go because it gets them out of the house. (more…)

The resistance to flexible working is entirely reasonable

by • Comment, Facilities management, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

Home workingIn recent media coverage of the decision by Yahoo to ban homeworking as well as a recent survey from Microsoft, the resistance to the idea that people work better when they are allowed to work flexibly has typically been put down to cultural inertia. Sometimes those who have resisted the uptake of flexible working have been portrayed as dinosaurs. While there’s no question that culture and management attitudes do create barriers to the uptake of flexible working, there is a growing recognition that certain flexible working practices may not be appropriate for many people and organisations and even specific sectors. The barriers may be there for a good reason.

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Yahoo case doesn’t tell the whole story of teleworking

by • Comment, Facilities management, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

Yahoo! Sunnyvale headquarters. October 28, 2001 (Y! Photo / Brian McGuiness)Yahoo! made headlines across the US and the rest of the world this week by announcing they are terminating the company’s telework program.  Does this signal, broadly, the pending demise of telework?  Here’s my take: this story is actually deeper than just about telework. Yahoo! has been wandering around aimlessly for a number of years, and it would appear that this particular measure is intended as some overdue shock therapy to jump-start a much needed culture shift and focus on what the company needs to survive in a world of rapid innovation and “big bang disruption” (see March 2013 HBR article by Larry Downes and Paul F. Nunes).

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Are you working or shirking from home?

by • Comment, Legal news, Technology, Workplace

Staff ill health

During recent weather-related travel disruption, I was inundated with various pieces of information on software that spies on home based employees to check that they really are working, not shirking from home. As Acas opens a consultation on a draft Code of Practice regarding the extended right to request flexible working; and figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) show the number of people working from home in the UK has risen to over 10 per cent – the advent of these systems begs the question: do employers really trust their staff enough to let them work remotely?

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Yahoo is not the only firm that doesn’t like flexible working

by • Comment, Facilities management, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

Yahoo! Sunnyvale headquarters. October 28, 2001 (Y! Photo / Brian McGuiness)As news emerged over the weekend from Silicon Valley that Yahoo had introduced a new policy that insisted employees work from the company’s HQ, a survey from O2 in the UK highlighted just how many firms are not as keen on the practice of flexible working as they might claim in theory. The question we need to ask is whether this represents a genuine shift away from the assumption that we are moving towards more agile working practices, or is this just the last knockings of the old guard?

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Companies failing to communicate flexible working policies

by • News, Technology, Workplace

consumerization-320x240

Less than one fifth of staff are being encouraged to work flexibly, with businesses failing to reap the rewards of increased productivity and employee well-being resulting from modern work practices and technology. New research by O2 reveals that whilst staff are ready to embrace new ways of working and understand the benefits, it is employers who are holding them back. More than three quarters (77 per cent) of employers say that flexible working is actively encouraged across their organisation but less than a fifth (19 per cent) of staff say their company encourages them to work flexibly. (more…)

Growing number of businesses want people back in the office, but not in all sectors

Growing number of businesses want people back in the office, but not in all sectors

by • Flexible working, News

Over two fifths (41 percent) of businesses have emphasised the need for people to work in a physical workspace such as an office over the past year, according to a new pollOver two fifths (41 percent) of businesses have emphasised the need for people to work in a physical workspace such as an office over the past year, according to a new poll from the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC). While most of the firms (67 percent) who require onsite working say it hasn’t impacted recruitment or retention, one in ten relevant businesses (9 percent) have seen staff leave in response. (more…)

The Kafka trap of return to office arguments

The Kafka trap of return to office arguments

by • Comment, Flexible working

This month I witnessed somebody misapplying the work of Kafka in an attempt to make a middlebrow point about the so-called return to officeRecently, I bemoaned how Orwell is often invoked in support of an argument by people who haven’t read him. They are usually drawing on some laundered misperception of his work, and especially Nineteen Eighty-Four. Well, just a few days ago, I witnessed somebody misapplying the work of Kafka in a similar attempt to make a middlebrow point about the so-called return to office. (more…)

Growing demand for homes and lab space may be met by repurposing vacant offices

Growing demand for homes and lab space may be met by repurposing vacant offices

by • News, Property

Rather than retrofitting secondary vacant offices, landlords are converting them into homes and life sciences laboratoriesA growing mismatch between supply and demand in the housing and life sciences sectors is fuelling a wave of office conversions across the UK, as developers seek to repurpose outdated vacant offices to meet changing needs, according to a new report from CBRE. According to the real estate firm, the rise in hybrid and remote working has left a significant volume of secondary office space vacant, with many buildings no longer fit for modern corporate requirements. Rather than invest in costly retrofitting, landlords and investors are increasingly exploring conversion opportunities – particularly into residential units and life sciences laboratories. (more…)

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