Homing in on the work issue

24 September, 2020

A new study by digital transformation firm, Adaptavist, highlights some strengths and threats to long-term productivity and employee well-being posed by improvised solutions during the transition to remote work. On the positive side, some 82% of people report they are equally (47%) if not more productive (35%) working from home, and company-wide communications have improved during the pandemic. However, the lack of a shared understanding of which tool to use and how to communicate with it, combined with the ‘always on’ nature of working from home, has been highlighted as bringing added stress and motivational challenges for workers.

The Adaptavist Digital Etiquette Study, which includes survey responses from 2800 knowledge-workers across the UK, US, Canada and Australia, shows remote-working offers major benefits for businesses, but new digital communication and productivity challenges have also emerged. Interestingly, the study found significant benefits to a 100% remote working approach. ‘Levelling the playing field between in-office and remote workers’ and ‘working in a more agile fashion with faster decision-making’ were seen as key benefits from the transition.

Other notable benefits include ‘Learning we can be more flexible in how we work’ ranked as the top benefit. Moreover, 52% agreed that company-wide communication had improved (39% neutral and 9% disagreed) and 48% agreed that collaboration had improved (41%, neutral and 11% disagreed). The reduction in office politics due to the removal of the physical office was also seen as a key benefit and 46% agreed that meeting effectiveness had improved. (42% neutral and 12% disagreed).

From a technology perspective, inefficient use of digital channels means businesses lose almost half a workday each week per employee, according to the study. The top 5 greatest challenges in running remote teams were: Technical issues; managing workloads; tracking what people were working on and the status of work; keeping teams motivated; and knowing how people are feeling. Even with the availability of new communication tools, the vast majority are still using email (71%) and spreadsheets (62%) to track work. On average, workers spent 45 minutes each day searching for information between different technology platforms. This increased to 50 minutes a day – almost half a day each week – for those using four platforms or more (42%). Less than half of workers had been given any training to ensure they are using these channels efficiently.