Over the last few years, with improved access and adoption of high-speed internet, people in many countries have the choice of working or studying from their residence instead of going to office or college. While this practice is gaining popularity because of its advantages and is being preferred by employees and students alike, there are certain concerns as well which have been flagged by employers and educational authorities. In my view, while the concerns are valid, they can be mitigated using creative measures.
The first and foremost benefit of working or studying from home is that it saves people the time taken to travel to their workplace or college everyday. This, in turn, results in people having more time to spend with their family and dedicate it towards recreational activities. Studies have proven that this lowers one’s stress levels and improves productivity. The environment at home also allows one to focus better on the task because the office space or classroom can be distracting making it difficult for people to pay attention.
Many employers and educational authorities, however, do not agree that working or studying from home is productive, and hence do not allow the same. Companies argue that it becomes difficult for them to monitor activities of the employee if they are working from home. To support their argument, they use examples of workers who were found to be working simultaneously for two companies and drawing salary from both, which is a violation of the company’s policies and the law. Human Resource executives also cite studies which say that teamwork gets affected when employees are working from their homes because employees have limited face-to-face interaction. Similarly, college authorities feel that students lose out on critical social skills if they prefer to study from home.
In my opinion, while there are certain valid disadvantages of studying or working from home, they can be mitigated by ensuring periodic in-person meetings and casualsocial gatherings which can be organised by the workplace or college. I firmly believe that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages by far, and employees and students should have the choice to decide what works for them.