Connecting Remotely

How to Get Employees to Cheerfully Put in More Hours

Who doesn’t want employees that are more productive in the workplace? Yet personal issues, illness and family obligations often prevent employees from coming in. That’s why so many employers are now enabling remote access to their network. Whether you call it “working from home,” or your “virtual office,” the idea is the same; your network is configured to give you and your staff the ability to work from some location other than the office.

While most business owners and managers pulling 60 hour work-weeks love the idea of putting in some of those hours from the comfort of their home, they often fear that employees given the same luxury won’t be as productive. However, studies have shown that employees working from home are actually far more productive than those who are limited to working at the office. The biggest fear is that employees will goof off and not take their job seriously; however, that fear is on the decline as more and more businesses are pursuing this (23 million and growing!)

While telecommuting will not work in every situation, offering work-from-home options where they make sense can give you a competitive advantage in attracting and retaining the best employees. Here are some additional benefits:

• Sick employees can continue to work without infecting the office or losing an entire day of work (at Performance Data we do this regularly so we don't get clients sick either!)
• Employees at home caring for sick family members can continue to work instead of taking off long periods.
• Bad weather or traffic jams won’t shut down your office (pull over and find a nice "hotspot")
• Key managers with heavy workloads will actually be more productive if they can work from home on evenings and weekends.
• Allowing employees flexibility during peak workloads (e.g., CPAs during tax season) makes them happier to put in the extra hours.
• Employees with temporary or permanent disabilities can be fully functional in their home environment.

There are several options for remotely accessing your network, and if you want to find out which method is right for you, contact us for a FREE Remote Workplace Action Plan. No cost. No obligation.