INTHEBLACK March 2025 - Magazine - Page 45
“Rather than having a mandated number of days, I think employees should
be encouraged to come to the office when there’s a specific purpose for them
to be there — where there’s a valid reason and where there’s a particular activity
that they’re going to be working on that works better in a face-to-face mode.”
JOHN HOPKINS, SWINBURNE’S SCHOOL OF BUSINESS, LAW AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP
professor of supply chain management
for Swinburne’s School of Business, Law
and Entrepreneurship, says any benefit
for an employee is a benefit for an employer.
“If people are happier at work, they’re
more likely to stay,” says Hopkins, who
has been researching flexible and remote
work trends for the past decade.
REMOTE WORK: A BOON FOR
THE DIGITAL WORKFORCE
Data from the World Economic Forum
estimates that by 2030, global digital jobs
that can be performed remotely will grow
by approximately 25 per cent to more than
90 million roles. These roles will include
software developers, finance managers
and financial risk specialists.
Bryan Whitefield, management consultant
and author of books Team Think and
Risky Business, says a benefit of fully remote
work is that employers can draw from a wider
talent pool.
“I’ve long been in favour of innovation in
resourcing teams, and prior to the pandemic,
there was much less innovation in how teams
were formed and how skill sets were sought
out,” he says. “Remote and hybrid work allows
businesses to resource in different ways.”
Collaboration tools like Slack and Trello
enable teams to work together from remote
locations and employers can track remote
employees’ work hours and productivity via
tools like ActivTrak and Teramind.
Remote work can also improve
financial wellbeing, with data from Cisco
showing Australian workers have saved
an average of A$10,000 a year by working
from home since the pandemic. More than
80 per cent ranked savings on fuel and/or
commuting among their top three areas
of savings, followed by spending less
on food and entertainment.
Environmental benefits are another
consideration. A study by Cornell and
Microsoft shows remote workers could have
a 54 per cent lower carbon footprint
compared to onsite workers, while hybrid
workers with two to four workdays at home
can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by
11 to 29 per cent. The study also shows that
office energy use is the main contributor
to the carbon footprint of onsite and hybrid
workers, while non-commute-related travel
becomes more significant as the number
of remote workdays increases.
At an organisational level, there is
opportunity for businesses to consider how
to creatively rethink their own office energy
consumption. For example, if there are only
a few people in the office on a given day,
perhaps there is no need to light, heat or
cool a whole floor.
While remote work presents financial
benefits, it also comes at a cost. Data from
Gartner shows only 24 per cent of hybrid
and remote knowledge workers report feeling
connected to their organisation’s culture.
Sanders adds that informal learning can
be more difficult to achieve remotely,
especially among newcomers.
“Having one or two days in the office
has value, especially for newcomers. It’s good
to have some time in the office because they
need to learn a lot and we have seen that that
is difficult if it is all online.”
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