Remote working is back

In the quest to achieve that corporate holy grail of increased productivity and staff morale, flexible working has gained much ground as a win-win option. This has been backed by a number of credible research pieces reporting the fact that companies have derived tangible commercial benefits from remote working programmes that allow selected staff to work away from the confines of the office.

It’s still a long way from being the rule, but it’s no longer the exception and, thankfully, we have long moved on from the ‘road warrior’ days when sales staff were equipped with mobile phones the size of bricks and laptops bigger than family-sized cars. In addition to greatly improved technology, legislation designed to improve workers’ work-life balance has pushed the case for flexible working among UK office monkeys.

But this inexorable march is now in danger of faltering because fears about losing control of their people is driving a pervasive shift among managers to rein in their flexible working policies. Those dark-age managerial Luddites still lurk, as does their paranoia that commercial secrets are at risk because a member of staff may drink one shandy too many and leave a company laptop in a lap-dancing club. And it is true that issues such as security fears and increased support costs associated with out-of-the-office staff have traditionally been factors inhibiting mobile access rollouts.

However, such issues are now generally well understood and, for most companies, can be solved in a satisfactorily cost-effective way, taking advantage of tumbling values and costs in the technology area as, for example, mobile phone operators fall over themselves to sign up companies to 3G data contracts. New data from broadband comparison website Top 10 Broadband notes that mobile data charges, although still high compared to traditional wired connections, are actually less than one-tenth of what they were two years ago when they averaged £45 per gigabyte.

All this means rapid ROI is possible for all but a tiny handful of mobile working deployments.

But, psychologically, there is a stumbling block. According to a new study from Microsoft, the number of workers who believe they can work flexibly is falling. But this has nothing to do with technology. The research attributes a recent fall in the number of staff working flexibly to the credit crunch. People feel they need to be seen to be working, perhaps as recession talk stokes the fear of redundancies. Based on interviews with more than 1,000 UK office workers, the survey claims that fears about job security and the overall deteriorating economic outlook are prompting workers – especially middle managers and their minions – to turn away from mobile working, with just 10% of workers in 2008 feeling they have the freedom to work remotely as part of their day-to-day job. This despite the fact that more than half of all UK firms offer mobile working programmes.

The danger is that, while these workers force themselves to come into the office so they can wave hello to their bosses and moan about the rubbish coffee from the company vending machine, morale will go out of the window at a time when that would be least helpful to all.

The survey goes on to reveal that one-quarter of senior managers say they would leave their job in six months if they could not work remotely. A further quarter of all UK businesses report having lost staff as a result of not being able to offer mobile working opportunities.

Another poll published earlier this year found that remote working is a key factor in staff retention. Of 3,000 workers polled across Europe and Russia by research firm Avaya, around one-third said they would ‘definitely change jobs’ to work for a firm that actively encourages and supports flexible working.

Even as technology continues its advance and becomes cheaper with more competition, this ‘win-win’ scenario of increased productivity and happier staff by way of flexible working is under real threat. Faced with dire economic straits and afraid of losing our jobs, we are in reverse. The lose-lose scenario is emboldened by economic negativity and it seems personal freedoms, such as the right to work from home and have your boss trust that you are indeed working as hard as you might in their presence, are the first casualty.

To counter this threat, businesses must refocus on the human factor and actively encourage flexible working when it can demonstrably improve productivity. In these times of economic uncertainty, enterprises need to squeeze every drop of efficiency from their operations and flexible working can help do that. It is nothing short of madness to let operational effectiveness suffer because of a misguided adherence to old-fashioned working practices. It is time for savvy companies to grasp the nettle and reassure worried staff that out of sight does not mean out of mind.

This article originally appeared in Financial Director magazine