STAFFING RESOURCE CENTER

Video conferencing. Virtual collaboration. Is it worth it? Or are those remote employees just taking your business for a ride -- or worse yet -- driving it into the ground?

Remember back in 2013 when Marissa Mayer banned Yahoo employees from telecommuting? She had a point. People who work from home are just a bunch of lazy hacks who sit around in their pajamas watching daytime television. Sure, they may log in, click around a little and answer a few emails, but they are hardly productive. There's a reason people want to work from home: They don't actually do any work, right?

Wrong.

How Productive Are Telecommuters, Really?

While it is entirely possible you'll have one or two lazy employees from time to time, it's important to remember that just because someone physically shows up to the office, doesn't mean they are producing. People spend lots of time on social media, personal email, shopping sites and even gaming sites. Even if you block those websites, employees find ways around it (smartphones, anyone?). In fact, businesses lose upwards of $600 billion per year thanks to distractions in the workplace.

The truth is the data falls on the side of telecommuting. Two-thirds of employers say they saw increased productivity among their teleworkers, and major corporations like Best Buy, Dow Chemical, JD Edwards, Compaq, and American Express report that their virtual employees are 15-43 percent more productive and spend an average of five more hours working per week than their in-office counterparts.

Want to Save Money? Virtual Work Options Could Be the Answer

U.S. companies are always looking to save money, and virtual work policies can facilitate cost savings. McKesson saves $2 million per year thanks to telecommuting, and IBM reduced costs across the board by $50 million in total. When employees can work from anywhere, it cuts back on real estate costs, utilities, relocation packages, absenteeism, turnover and even salary budgets, because 36 percent of American workers would choose the ability to telecommute over pay raises or larger starting salaries.

Employees with traditional work arrangements take advantage of sick days to handle personal business they can't manage throughout the day. In fact, 78 percent of employees who call in sick are not actually ill. They call off to care for a family member or because of stress. Unscheduled absences cost employers $1,800 per employee per year, a cost that can be wiped out with telecommuting. In fact, employees who are contagious or feeling under the weather are more likely to work from home, since their computer is right there, than if they called off from their traditional working arrangement.

Telecommuting Boosts Employee Satisfaction

Employee satisfaction is a metric that seems more like a puzzle to solve than an attainable goal for many organizations. Virtual work policies allow employees to achieve work-life balance they can't realize when they commute to and from the office. People are pulled in a thousand directions in today's world. It's not uncommon for middle-aged workers to have to care for both dependent children and aging parents at the same time. That alone puts significant stress on an employee. When you pile on other personal obligations, it often seems like U.S. workers have to choose between focusing on their families or focusing on their careers, as they feel it is nearly impossible to do both well.

Virtual work arrangements allow people to achieve the balance they are looking for. They can get up a few hours before the family and crank out high-quality work, or they can login after the kids have gone to bed to squeeze in a few more hours. They can leave throughout the day to take mom to her doctor's appointments and then slide back into work without missing a beat. Companies that value their employee's work-life balance are rewarded with loyal employees.

Some 95 percent of employers report stronger retention numbers after implementing telecommuting policies. Employees who feel they are balancing work and life well are far less likely to seek out a new job where they would potentially lose that ability and be forced back into choosing between their career and home life.

Learning to Manage a Virtual Workforce

Successfully implementing a virtual work policy that benefits both your business and your employees isn't as simple as just saying, "Everyone can work from home now!" Policies need to be planned out carefully and strategically, and leaders need to develop sound strategies for effectively managing virtual teams to ensure productivity.

These are just some of the strategies that can help keep virtual teams running smoothly:

1. Choose wisely. Some people are just not well-suited for telecommuting. Your ideal virtual employee is self-motivated, disciplined, responsive, and communicates well in writing.

2. Consider time zones. Try to establish workflows that move from east to west, so team members can work comfortably in their own time zones.

3. Invest in the right technology. Effective virtual teams use a variety of cloud-based programs to facilitate work and collaboration. When tools are selected, make sure everyone is formally trained and there are IT experts on call to respond to any technology crises that may arise.

4. Set communication guidelines. Make sure everyone understands how to get a hold of one another, whether it's email, phone or company messaging system. They should also be trained on keeping their tone neutral, as miscommunication is an easy trap when people communicate via text.

5. Be available. Managers will expect their virtual employees to be available and responsive throughout the day, so they too should be available and responsive. Isolation and feeling "forgotten" are common complaints among teleworkers, so managers should go above and beyond when it comes to responsiveness.

6. Keep the group in the loop. Hold regular team meetings either via conference call or videoconference. Additionally, individuals should submit weekly progress reports so managers can address group progress in meetings or weekly emails to the team.

7. Provide ongoing feedback. Virtual employees don't have the same opportunity to hear, "good job on that report," now and again. Informal feedback is important for all employees, so managers should be prepared to offer it when chatting with an employee on the phone or when engaged in email communication.

8. Encourage casual conversation. Virtual employees lose the camaraderie of the office. There is no "water cooler talk" about television shows or current events, they can't grab lunch together or commiserate problems. Encourage your team to call each other, message one another or email to bounce ideas around, or just to say hello.

9. Be flexible. Remember that part of the reason why employees want virtual work options is to maintain work-life balance. If an employee needs to take mom to an appointment or pick up a sick child from school, provide that freedom.

10. Celebrate wins. You can't gather virtual teams together at the close of a project to celebrate over a pizza or a couple of beers at the local watering hole. Employees want to be recognized when they achieve goals, so try a virtual reward ceremony. Send each team member a small gift to mark the group's success, and schedule a videoconference when they will all open their gifts at once.

Don't write virtual workers off as lazy. With the right strategy and approach, virtual work options could transform your business.

Sources:

http://globalworkplaceanalytics.com/resources/costs-benefits

http://fortune.com/2013/04/19/marissa-mayer-breaks-her-silence-on-yahoos-telecommuting-policy/

https://https://www.bc.edu/content/dam/files/centers/cwf/individuals/pdf/benefitsCEOFlex.pdf

https://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=https://www.forbes.com/sites/meghanbiro/2014/01/12/telecommuting-is-the-future-of-work/&refURL=https://www.google.com/&referrer=https://www.google.com/