Work at home increases productivity
Remote work has a positive effect on performance. We in Web-payment.ru , a project on payment systems, were convinced of this by our own experience. This is also confirmed by a recent large study, the results of which were published in the interview format by Harvard Business Review (HBR), a Harvard popular science journal dedicated to business management. In an interview with Nicholas Bloom, a professor of economics at Stanford University talks about the impact of the working environment on employee productivity. The interview was conducted by Scott Berinato (Scott Berinato) - Senior Editor of HBR.
The essence of the study
Nikolai Bloom, along with colleague James Liang (James Liang), a graduate student at Stanford University and co-founder of the Chinese travel website Ctrip, offered the Ctrip call center staff to work at home. The experiment lasted 9 months. Half of the volunteers were allowed to work remotely at home, the rest of the staff remained in the office as a control group. The data on call center productivity collected during the study showed that, compared with the operators who worked in the office, “home workers” not only felt happier and less often dismissed, but also turned out to be more productive.
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Significant improvement in performance. A group of volunteers who worked at home took more calls than their colleagues who stayed in the office.
Berinato : Should most of us switch to remote operation? Will employee productivity actually improve if companies allow them to stay at home? Professor Bloom, what does your research show?
Bloom : The results of the study, which we got on the example of Ctrip, amazed me. The founders of the site believed that remote work would allow the company to save a certain amount of money on renting premises and furniture needed for office work. However, the result of such savings will be a decrease in productivity due to the fact that at home the employees will become less disciplined, believed in Ctrip. Contrary to expectations, we found that people who worked at home processed 13.5% more calls than their colleagues who stayed in the office, which means that Ctrip received almost 1 additional working day per week. Surprise was the fact that employees who worked remotely, quit twice as rare as those who were forced to go to work. As expected, operators who received calls at home confirmed that it became more comfortable to work.
Berinato : And how much was Ctrip able to save on rent and furniture?
Blum : According to their estimates, in nine months the company saved $ 1,900 per employee.
Reducing the number of layoffs is understandable - working from home gives you more freedom, for example, if you have children. But how can you explain the increase in productivity? Why did people do more work at home than in the office?
On the third, in our opinion, this is due to the fact that employees are in a more relaxed atmosphere, in which it is easier to handle calls. At home, people were not distracted by communication with colleagues and other trifles that interfered with work. Another two-thirds of the increase in productivity is due to the fact that at home Ctrip operators worked more. Workers remotely did not need to spend time on the road. Thus, they started their duties earlier, took a short lunch break (in the office it takes much longer than at home) and worked until the end of the working day. In addition, employees who worked remotely, less often took sick leave. It is noteworthy that if you enter "remote work" in a search engine, you will find quite a lot of negative reviews and articles proving that working at home is not as effective as office work. In fact, everything is just the opposite.
It turns out that Marissa Mayer, who, as you know, banned Yahoo employees from working at home last year, was wrong?
It is not that simple. There are many factors that can lead to such a decision, including a work culture. After all, as you know, not everyone treats their work as responsibly as Ctrip employees. In addition, we conducted our research on the example of a call center that has its own specifics - the work in it is easy to evaluate and perform remotely.
Did the workers know that you were measuring their productivity? Wasn’t the experiment just a period when employees deliberately tried to prove that working from home is more effective, after which the results worsened dramatically?
Analysis of factors affecting productivity is an important task. In Ctrip, they tried to solve it, relying on a study that lasted nine months. Positive dynamics of work at home was observed during this entire period. It is highly doubtful that increased productivity was caused only by a flash of enthusiasm from a group of employees.
Will knowledge workers and creative workers be as productive at home as call center employees?
We believe that working from home will be the more effective, the more monotonous the task facing the employee. In order to make unambiguous conclusions about the influence of the working environment on the productivity of workers in the creative sphere and on the productivity of teamwork, we need to conduct additional research. However, on the basis of already available data, we can state that for most companies the best solution would be to allow their subordinates to work 1-2 days a week at home. Such a work week schedule will help improve the well-being of employees, reduce their fatigue, help you attract talents and reduce staff turnover. JetBlue is already using a similar strategy. The company employs employees who live within 3 hours of accessibility from the main office. It is close enough to come to work several times a week, but also far enough to cover a much larger radius to attract new applicants. When I asked JetBlue management about their policies, they replied that it helped them hire educated, highly skilled people who were looking for a job with a free schedule. The airlines are confident that this approach has significantly improved the quality of staff.
Who else likes remote work?
For people with a structured social life - senior employees, unmarried employees, young parents. We found that younger workers, whose social life is connected with the office, as a rule, are not eager to work at home. Currently, employees who spend a considerable amount of time working remotely can be divided into one of two categories: ordinary workers with hourly wages, for example, call center operators, editors, developers, whose work can be easily traced; or professionals and top managers who, presumably, have a high level of self-motivation.
Are there those who cannot or who should not work at home?
Of course. Not everyone wants to work at home, and not everyone is disciplined enough for this. At Ctrip, we collaborated with a group of volunteers, they were all motivated for effective homework and this is an example of how it should be (going to distant work should be voluntary, otherwise you will not get positive results). Some participants in the experiment abandoned this form of work after nine months, and it was these people who in the course of the study showed the weakest results compared to other employees who worked at home. They tried to work remotely and realized that it was not for them. The rest of the employees, who showed the best results and proved their effectiveness in remote work, continued to work at home.
As far as I understand, managers will oppose this practice, since it is more difficult to control subordinates at a distance.
Resistance will be on average management.
How do you deal with this?
One of the reasons why Ctrip went to the experiment was to convince some skeptical managers that flexible working hours would not hurt business. And for this we needed data confirming this position. I always advise managers to use natural opportunities, such as bad weather, which prevents people from getting to the office in order to assess how productive their subordinate is at home. Any obstacle that allows people to work remotely is an opportunity to see how effective they are outside the office.
But if every employee will work at home two days a week, will it not bring chaos into the work schedule? How do you organize office work?
There are two effective ways to deal with this problem. One of them is to alternate the days of remote work in such a way that a certain number of employees are always in the office. This approach will be useful if you need to save on renting a room and at the same time keep the number of staff. Another option is to create a work schedule and mark all the days when employees are required to appear in the office. Thus, no confusion will arise. Each method has its pros and cons.
I begin to regret not interviewing you remotely while sitting in my underwear in my kitchen. Perhaps this would be my best interview.
The fact that you work at home does not mean that you should not dress. But, of course, next month you can take a “test interview” from home from me and compare the results. As they say, everything is relative.
The essence of the study
Nikolai Bloom, along with colleague James Liang (James Liang), a graduate student at Stanford University and co-founder of the Chinese travel website Ctrip, offered the Ctrip call center staff to work at home. The experiment lasted 9 months. Half of the volunteers were allowed to work remotely at home, the rest of the staff remained in the office as a control group. The data on call center productivity collected during the study showed that, compared with the operators who worked in the office, “home workers” not only felt happier and less often dismissed, but also turned out to be more productive.
')
Significant improvement in performance. A group of volunteers who worked at home took more calls than their colleagues who stayed in the office.
Berinato : Should most of us switch to remote operation? Will employee productivity actually improve if companies allow them to stay at home? Professor Bloom, what does your research show?
Bloom : The results of the study, which we got on the example of Ctrip, amazed me. The founders of the site believed that remote work would allow the company to save a certain amount of money on renting premises and furniture needed for office work. However, the result of such savings will be a decrease in productivity due to the fact that at home the employees will become less disciplined, believed in Ctrip. Contrary to expectations, we found that people who worked at home processed 13.5% more calls than their colleagues who stayed in the office, which means that Ctrip received almost 1 additional working day per week. Surprise was the fact that employees who worked remotely, quit twice as rare as those who were forced to go to work. As expected, operators who received calls at home confirmed that it became more comfortable to work.
Berinato : And how much was Ctrip able to save on rent and furniture?
Blum : According to their estimates, in nine months the company saved $ 1,900 per employee.
Reducing the number of layoffs is understandable - working from home gives you more freedom, for example, if you have children. But how can you explain the increase in productivity? Why did people do more work at home than in the office?
On the third, in our opinion, this is due to the fact that employees are in a more relaxed atmosphere, in which it is easier to handle calls. At home, people were not distracted by communication with colleagues and other trifles that interfered with work. Another two-thirds of the increase in productivity is due to the fact that at home Ctrip operators worked more. Workers remotely did not need to spend time on the road. Thus, they started their duties earlier, took a short lunch break (in the office it takes much longer than at home) and worked until the end of the working day. In addition, employees who worked remotely, less often took sick leave. It is noteworthy that if you enter "remote work" in a search engine, you will find quite a lot of negative reviews and articles proving that working at home is not as effective as office work. In fact, everything is just the opposite.
It turns out that Marissa Mayer, who, as you know, banned Yahoo employees from working at home last year, was wrong?
It is not that simple. There are many factors that can lead to such a decision, including a work culture. After all, as you know, not everyone treats their work as responsibly as Ctrip employees. In addition, we conducted our research on the example of a call center that has its own specifics - the work in it is easy to evaluate and perform remotely.
Did the workers know that you were measuring their productivity? Wasn’t the experiment just a period when employees deliberately tried to prove that working from home is more effective, after which the results worsened dramatically?
Analysis of factors affecting productivity is an important task. In Ctrip, they tried to solve it, relying on a study that lasted nine months. Positive dynamics of work at home was observed during this entire period. It is highly doubtful that increased productivity was caused only by a flash of enthusiasm from a group of employees.
Will knowledge workers and creative workers be as productive at home as call center employees?
We believe that working from home will be the more effective, the more monotonous the task facing the employee. In order to make unambiguous conclusions about the influence of the working environment on the productivity of workers in the creative sphere and on the productivity of teamwork, we need to conduct additional research. However, on the basis of already available data, we can state that for most companies the best solution would be to allow their subordinates to work 1-2 days a week at home. Such a work week schedule will help improve the well-being of employees, reduce their fatigue, help you attract talents and reduce staff turnover. JetBlue is already using a similar strategy. The company employs employees who live within 3 hours of accessibility from the main office. It is close enough to come to work several times a week, but also far enough to cover a much larger radius to attract new applicants. When I asked JetBlue management about their policies, they replied that it helped them hire educated, highly skilled people who were looking for a job with a free schedule. The airlines are confident that this approach has significantly improved the quality of staff.
Who else likes remote work?
For people with a structured social life - senior employees, unmarried employees, young parents. We found that younger workers, whose social life is connected with the office, as a rule, are not eager to work at home. Currently, employees who spend a considerable amount of time working remotely can be divided into one of two categories: ordinary workers with hourly wages, for example, call center operators, editors, developers, whose work can be easily traced; or professionals and top managers who, presumably, have a high level of self-motivation.
Are there those who cannot or who should not work at home?
Of course. Not everyone wants to work at home, and not everyone is disciplined enough for this. At Ctrip, we collaborated with a group of volunteers, they were all motivated for effective homework and this is an example of how it should be (going to distant work should be voluntary, otherwise you will not get positive results). Some participants in the experiment abandoned this form of work after nine months, and it was these people who in the course of the study showed the weakest results compared to other employees who worked at home. They tried to work remotely and realized that it was not for them. The rest of the employees, who showed the best results and proved their effectiveness in remote work, continued to work at home.
As far as I understand, managers will oppose this practice, since it is more difficult to control subordinates at a distance.
Resistance will be on average management.
How do you deal with this?
One of the reasons why Ctrip went to the experiment was to convince some skeptical managers that flexible working hours would not hurt business. And for this we needed data confirming this position. I always advise managers to use natural opportunities, such as bad weather, which prevents people from getting to the office in order to assess how productive their subordinate is at home. Any obstacle that allows people to work remotely is an opportunity to see how effective they are outside the office.
But if every employee will work at home two days a week, will it not bring chaos into the work schedule? How do you organize office work?
There are two effective ways to deal with this problem. One of them is to alternate the days of remote work in such a way that a certain number of employees are always in the office. This approach will be useful if you need to save on renting a room and at the same time keep the number of staff. Another option is to create a work schedule and mark all the days when employees are required to appear in the office. Thus, no confusion will arise. Each method has its pros and cons.
I begin to regret not interviewing you remotely while sitting in my underwear in my kitchen. Perhaps this would be my best interview.
The fact that you work at home does not mean that you should not dress. But, of course, next month you can take a “test interview” from home from me and compare the results. As they say, everything is relative.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/290002/
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