Workplace Organisation

Another point that came up in our interviews and that should not be underestimated in a remote work situation is the workplace organisation at home. This includes the technical and office equipment, time management, and dealing with a new work-life-balance, among others. In this section, we will briefly highlight some issues that should be taken into account when assessing motivation and productivity of employees working remotely, as they can affect the performance and satisfaction to a great deal. 

• One interviewee said that their equipment at home was not the right one, such as their desk or the chair, which is causing frustration and dissatisfaction. In another interview, we discovered a potential solution: Since the work-from-home situation lasted that long, the company allowed their employees to take their office equipment (including their monitors and chairs) to their home. This increased motivation by a lot. 

• Some people mentioned getting distracted more easily either by their pets or children. Particularly for people with children (and even more as a single parent), the home working situation poses serious challenges. For that exact reason, the CEO of one company told us that the first people who would be allowed to go back to the offices are parents and those job roles that depend on technical systems, which are only accessible in the office, such as accounting. 

• Apparently, even for people in the same age group and with the same job description, the way to organise work from home differs a lot by personal preferences. For example, we were told from the situation in a shared flat, where three colleagues are both living and working. While each of them has more or less the same schedule and workloads, they interpret work from home differently: While one person has set up his own desk and goes to his “home office room” as if going to work, another person just opens her laptop on the kitchen table, and a third is “wandering around” the house, always making himself comfortable in a new location. Likewise, one person is “always-on” and throughout the day checks on his work, while another only works in previously set up “working hours”.

So while these examples show some differing approaches as to how to organise the workplace at home, the employer can help a lot by providing support and flexibility in order to find an individual solution for each employee.