Top Ten Challenges of Working Remotely

One of the the top ten challenges of working remotely is missing social interaction (27%) according to a survey by Connectivity experts 99&One.

Research among 2,016 flexible workers, carried out before the crisis revealed other downsides experienced by employees who work from home:

1. Missing social interaction (27%)
2. Feeling the need to prove productivity (24%)
3. Colleagues taking longer to respond (18%)
4. Connectivity issues (17%)
5. Being disconnected from colleagues (16%)
6. Feeling out of sight, out of mind (16%)
7. Feeling out the loop with what is going on across the business (15%)
8. Getting distracted even more than being in the office (15%)
9. Relying on technology too heavily (14%)
10. Feeling isolated (12%)

Imagine how many millions of people are experieincing these feelings during Lockdown!  So how can we ease this pain.  Here are 3 top hacks.

1.  Training for Social Interaction

Training your team – whether that is on the new remote technologies they have to use, well-being techniques or how to run a virtual meeting will ease the sudden shift to remote work.

Employees who get sufficient training about remote working technologies are five times happier (56%) at work than those who are not offered any support (11%).

Trained workers are also more than twice as likely (45% compared to 18%) to say that they are more productive in the same amount of time when working flexibly. Go to our Virtual Training Programmes here

2.  Survey to find out what support they need

Want to know exactly what your remote workers want to have to make them feel more connected? Ask them

Send out a survey with a few questions asking how they currently are currently feeling, what they need help with and what support they would like to enable better physical, emotional and financial well-being.

This allows you to tailor initiatives to exactly cover what your people want.

3.  Set Up Virtual Company Activities

You could ask a simple question in the survey about what virtual activities your people would like to take part in.  Here at SWR, for example, our team are growing potatoes and we do virtual catch-ups to see whose are growing the best.

Our Cornish client has a virtual DIY update gallery and another runs a Hats on Friday team meeting.  If you normally have Pizza on a Thursday evening – do it virtually or why not ask for volunteers for a quiz session.

We could be in for the long haul. Take time to consider how you can mitigate those Top Ten challenges of working remotely.

Finally, are you ready with your future smart workforce model for post lockdown.  Think it through while you have time.  Read this