Most people on the internet have been raving about how working from home is the best thing that happened because of flexible timing and remote work. Sure it is a boon for many but have you ever thought about the ugly truth of working from home? Stay tuned on this article and you will find out.
Decreased interaction with higher management.
Working from home might delay your promotion because decreased daily interaction with your boss will make it harder for the management to understand your value and assess your impact when you are not around. Lack of face to face communication can make it difficult for you to discuss your ideas and sell your skills resulting in loss of recognition. You want your management to depend on your skills which can become much harder to do while staying at home but not impossible. Decreased productivity is another matter of concern due to various distractions happening in the household.
Work and personal life getting mixed.
You can’t really separate your work life and personal life while working at home. Background noises, disturbance from pets, kids or other family members can lead to reduced concentration and lack of motivation.
It is usually found that other people in the house don’t take your job seriously when you are working from home and they consider you “available” to do other household chores like cleaning , washing cars etc. Flexible work timings can cause burnout and stress on your personal life because it becomes difficult to draw a line between work life and personal life.
Lack of office setting.
You can’t replicate your office scenario at home. Lack of proper office equipment like furniture, files, computer, internet connection, fax/copying machine etc. can become a serious disadvantage and buying all these stuff will cause a hole in your pocket.
Also it becomes difficult to access all kinds of data and documents. If the data is available only on papers then continuous office visits will cost you time and energy.
Lagging in meeting deadlines.
Working from home can sometime cause time lag in meeting deadlines because of continuous disturbances and mood-swings that happen more when you are working from home. (Weird I know but this happens)
You also feel tempted to do other things while working like eating your favourite ice-cream or playing with your pet that reduces your concentration. Degree of procrastination can spiral out of control and self-regulation is tough.
Unmonitored performance.
This can be a serious disadvantage especially for new comers or freshers who have just entered the corporate world. Such people need regular guidance from their seniors or peers which becomes difficult. It was found from Reddit that employees might often tend to laze around and take frequent breaks, resulting in longer break time and less work time, when the breaks and work go unmonitored. Strict efficiency is not always possible when you are working remotely.
So what is the ideal situation? There are pros and cons of every situation. All we have to do is weigh both and find out the most optimal situation. Organisations who are finding it difficult to handle employees over internet can use various employee engagement methods to make sure they remain efficient and productive.
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