Remote employees - our philosophy
28 July 2023
Office lunch in our building’s atrium when two out-of-state employees were in town.
This essay discusses the philosophy of our business to have employees work remotely. We welcome your comments.
The main advantages of remote employees are:
Workers prefer to work remotely. It saves them the time to commute, allows them to work when the weather or roads are bad, gives them more flexibility in their lives and allows them to work when not 100% well, when infectious or when out of town.
Some employees prefer to work by themselves and not in an office setting.
Some of my employees have suggested they might get another job if forced to come to the office.
On the other hand, some prefer the office, at least occasionally, for the social aspects, because it is quieter than at home or because they have better physical conditions for working.
Businesses have a broader pool of employees to choose from (nationally instead of locally).
Businesses can grow without acquiring more office space and hiring additional staff to deal with the growing workforce in the office.
It reduces office tensions between employees that don’t get along.
It reduces excessive office chit-chat or socializing.
Office expenses are much less.
The main disadvantages appear to be:
There is less collaboration between employees. Random meetings between employees may lead to good ideas or a stronger sense of business camaraderie which cannot be easily emulated through virtual meetings, telephone calls or emails.
Some employers feel employees are less productive at home than at the office. In our business, this is hard to measure, but employees seem to be as productive at home as in the office.
Employers may feel they have less control over employees at home than at the office. On the other hand, even at the office, employees may websurf or engage in other nonproductive activity that is hard to detect.
Employees may have personal challenges (isolation, distractions, technical) when working at home, see also here.
Our business creates and maintains a comprehensive but free online pathology textbook funded by advertising (job ads, website banner ads and Eblasts to newsletter subscribers). We currently have 24 part-time employees other than myself, including 8 in other states. For us, the main issues in remote work are:
The ability to seek employees nationwide.
The ability to grow without adding more office space.
Minimizing employee turnover by being more attuned to employee sentiment (i.e. employees like working remotely).
A sense that we have lost some employee teamwork and generation of ideas, although this is difficult to quantify.
We have tried to compensate for the loss of “teamwork” by scheduling:
Regular virtual meetings, but trying to limit them so the time does not prevent employees from working.
Monthly lunches (optional), either in the building’s atrium or at a local restaurant.
Virtual “coffee breaks” (optional), which are 30 minute meetings that are intentionally informal.
Planning office lunches with non-local employees when they are in town so everyone can meet them in person.
We have thought about planning occasional events (picnics or other social events) for employees and their families, but have not done so yet.
What does your office do regarding remote employees?
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