REMOTE WORK HAS PAID OFF WITH STRONG PRODUCTIVITY, MORALE
Apple executives have wavered on a return to the office in the face of employee resistance, shelving a plan to require workers to be in the office three days a week. Meanwhile, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has made a very direct and open statement on his expectation that workers will return to the office — telling them, “If you don’t show up, we will assume you have resigned.”
Clearly, the future workplace is still a topic of heated debate in the third year of the COVID-19 pandemic, which upended how work is done worldwide in March 2020.
At Vista, a Cimpress company that helps small business owners with marketing, we decided to implement a “remote-first” working policy in August 2020. This is so much more than simply giving team members permission to work from home. We provide access to physical offices for those who need an in-person work environment, but our team members are empowered to work when and where they are able to do their best work, with our primary workspaces being remote.
Since we put that policy into place, we’ve experienced many great benefits that this approach to work can bring.
Over the last nearly two years, we’ve learned a lot about what we need to be productive and how best to bring a new, better work experience to our company. We have invested in tools, benefits, technologies, processes and policies that not only enable productivity but improve the experience.
Now, 2,000 workers at Cimpress/Vista are experiencing firsthand the benefits that this newfound flexibility provides. We call it work-life harmony, which means scheduling work to fit around your life rather than the other way around.
In my case, I’ve replaced my morning commute with a daily workout, and I love having the flexibility to do things like run errands on Thursday afternoon or fold laundry during lunch. My favorite thing, though, is being able to attend all my godson’s Little League practices and games during the week. They start at 4 p.m., and I’d never be able to swing that with my previous afternoon commute.
Since changing our approach, an internal survey of our workforce shows about 70 percent say it has improved their work-life balance. That figure was 56 percent in October 2020.
We believe that enforcing days in the office stifles creativity and reduces productivity as employees carve many hours out of their day to commute to work. Remote workers can now manage their hours around times when they’re most productive and also enjoy breakfast with their families, exercise or volunteer in their child’s classroom.
Cimpress and Vista have also seen an increase in female employee retention rates, an increase in hires for female leadership positions and an increase in the number of applications from historically underrepresented minorities. Remote working can be a great equalizer in the workplace, and companies that embrace diversity unlock an even richer company culture.
According to Ladders, a career site for jobs that pay $100,000 or more, 25 percent of all professional jobs in North America will be remote by the end of 2022 — which only goes to show that there is a desire for remote work. Big technology and other companies could quite possibly see a “brain drain” or exodus of their current talent as their employees seek more remote-friendly work environments.
In the future, new and exciting technologies will be created with employees who prefer to work remotely in mind. Digital working experiences that involve culture, learning and development will continue to improve, and with developments in the metaverse and similar technologies, we will be able to do just about anything in a digital world that we could do in a physical office, from onboarding new team members to holding all-hands meetings.
There are many ways for this flexible approach to employment to evolve, but what’s important is it will be the remote workers who lead this change through their feedback, opinions and stories. The most exciting thing is that remote working is by no means a finished product and will continue to evolve as innovative employees and leaders work together to create their ideal working environment.
The possibilities are boundless.
Remote workers can now manage their hours around times when they’re most productive and also exercise, enjoy breakfast with their families or volunteer in their child’s classroom.