Remote work advocates often focus on the work-life improvement for employees who have the opportunity to work from home, but they talk less about the benefits to employers.
A recent study on remote work productivity flips that narrative, showing that, for many kinds of jobs, people who work away from the office may perform better than their cubicle-bound colleagues, especially employees in complex jobs that demand heavy cognitive capacity.
Detailing remote work productivity
The study, “Unpacking the Role of a Telecommuter’s Job in Their Performance: Examining Job Complexity, Problem Solving, Interdependence, and Social Support,” was published in the February 2019 edition of the Journal of Business and Psychology.
Ravi Gajendran, assistant professor in the Florida International University Department of Global Leadership and Management, and Timothy Golden, professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lally School of Management, were co-authors of the study. Gajendran says in an article on phys.org that their research shows remote work contributes to better performance for employees in complex jobs, possibly due to the benefit of fewer interruptions that are common in an office setting.
“We find that for most job characteristics we examine in our study, telecommuting doesn’t significantly hurt job performance,” Gajendran says in the article. “For some job features, performance is better with more extensive telecommuting, and in others, the impact is neutral.”
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For their study, Gajendran and Golden tested data from a random sample of 273 remote workers and their supervisors at an organization that had a voluntary remote work program. Virtual workers at the firm held jobs in all areas, from marketing, programming, and accounting to engineering, finance, and sales. Most respondents worked remotely about two days per week.
“One surprising result: telecommuting improved job performance when social support from coworkers or managers is low, suggesting perhaps that distance buffers employees from the downsides of unsupportive relationships at work,” the article says.
“If you don’t have a supportive environment, maybe you’re better off being away from it,” Gajendran says in the article. “That may help with performance.”
He says the results may also show the impact of generational differences among workers.
“We haven’t done a good job of understanding how electronic communication can substitute face-to-face interaction—the thought is that when you’re away from the office something suffers,” Gajendran says in the article. “Also, there may be a generation of people just as comfortable, if not more, working via electronic technology as face-to-face.”
Spotting a trend among remote work productivity studies
The results of this new study are echoed by similar surveys of the past few years that show positive effects on productivity when people work remotely.
For example, a 2018 Indeed study showed that 57% of remote workers surveyed said they were more productive when working from home.
“Not only do workers feel more productive, but their employers also agree: 72% of companies with remote-work policies say they make workers more productive,” an Indeed blog post about the survey says. “Another 22% say remote workers are equally as productive, and only 3% say their workers are less productive at home.”
A DZone article cites another study indicating that, over a nine-month period, flex workers performed better, were sick less often, worked longer hours, and were happier with their jobs.
“There’s a sense that flexible working is still a minority activity in the workplace, but hopefully as our understanding of it, and especially of when it does and does not work, increases, so too will our willingness to engage in it,” the article says.
As the evidence continues to roll in showing both employee and employer benefits from remote work, it becomes increasingly clear that such willingness to offer added flexibility is more than just a nice idea for companies. If they want to succeed in the new world of work, it’s a necessity.
Whether you’re an employer seeking remote talent, or a prospective employee looking for a flexible work opportunity, FlexJobs has you covered. Learn more today!
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