How You Introduce Remote Work in Your Company
Tim Fischer9/8/2023
You plan to modernize your company and you're wondering if remote work fits in? Then definitely continue reading now.
Table of contents
- Remote Work: Definition
- Who is Remote Work suitable for?
- What forms of Remote Work are there?
- What are the advantages of Remote Work?
- Less Social Contacts
- The former scores with low prices and good scalability. However, with providers outside the EU, you should pay particular attention to data protection. A privately hosted cloud in Germany, on the other hand, offers better protection against cyber-attacks and also complies with GDPR regulations. A hybrid cloud represents a middle way. Here, sensitive data is stored in the private cloud and non-critical files in a public cloud.
- Video Conferencing Software
For years, many companies were wary of remote work, fearing it would negatively impact the company culture. However, after the great "remote work experiment" during the pandemic, there has been a change in mindset. Numerous studies also show that both employers and employees benefit from the flexible form of work. But what exactly does remote work mean? What are the advantages and disadvantages? And what steps are necessary to successfully implement remote work in your own company? Our guide answers all your questions about remote work.
Remote Work: Definition
Remote work is a work model where employees work from a location outside the company office. This could be an employee's home, a co-working space, or a café, for example. Communication with the company and other employees is then carried out via collaboration tools such as Slack and Microsoft Teams.
Remote Work vs. Home Office
While the terms "remote work" and "home office" are often used synonymously, they are not the same. As the name suggests, home office refers to working from home. The employees have to set up their workplace at their place of residence and be available to the employer during working hours. They are also expected to participate in regular online meetings. Occasionally, they may also need to come to the office to complete tasks that cannot be handled online.
Thus, home office is a subset of remote work, which is not exclusively limited to working from home. Remote work, on the other hand, is not restricted to the home office. Rather, working from home is one form of remote work. It can be done from any location without being physically bound to a specific work place. As long as the employees have a digital infrastructure, they can perform their work without any problems. Contact with the company is made online or by telephone. The working hours are usually flexible and can be freely arranged.
Who is Remote Work suitable for?
Remote work is suitable for companies and professions where most tasks can be completed online or from a local device. Personal contact with customers and team members is not required for these jobs. Employees only need a computer, certain collaboration tools, and a functioning internet connection to complete their tasks. Some examples of remote jobs are:
- Author/Translator/Blogger
- Teacher/Trainer
- Consultant
- Accountant
- Engineer
- Programmer
- Web Developer
- Therapist
- Online Marketer
Some jobs can also be adapted to suit remote work. For instance, many HR managers nowadays use virtual interviews and onboardings instead of conducting the conversations on site. In contrast, there are of course jobs that require the personal presence of employees and cannot be done remotely. These include, among other things, care professions, service industry and transportation jobs, as well as all activities that involve operating large technical machines.
What forms of Remote Work are there?
There are three main types of remote work:
- Complete Remote Working: Here, the physical presence of the employees is not necessary at all. Communication with the company takes place exclusively online. This form is especially common among freelancers, as many of them do not personally meet their customers.
- Partial Remote Working: In this form, employees work mostly from home. However, they must appear in the office on certain dates, for example three days a week. Often, multiple employees share the same workspace at different times in the company building.
- Teleworking: is another form of remote work, where workplaces are set up at the employees' homes. The company provides them not only with computer hardware and software, but also with the furniture.
What are the advantages of Remote Work?
Compared to static office jobs, remote work offers some advantages, both for employers and employees:
Cost Savings
A number of fixed costs can be reduced with remote work, including:
- Power consumption
- Water consumption
- Rent for offices & parking spaces
- Investment costs for setting up workplaces and hardware
- Canteen costs
- Ongoing costs for on-premise IT
Employees gain time
For employees, the journey to and from work is eliminated with remote work. This can save them several hours per day, which they can use for their families and for leisure activities.Increase in productivity
Many employees are able to focus better in the home office and thus increase their productivity
. The reasons are clear: less distraction from colleagues and no one simply coming into the office and interrupting the workflow. In addition, nonessential but time-consuming ad-hoc meetings are eliminated since meeting times are planned in advance.However, not all employees can perform at the same level under the same working conditions. There are also employees who find it difficult to motivate themselves in the face of reduced social contact. To find the right working environment for your employees, you should therefore agree on a remote test phase.Better Work-Life Balance
The time saved by eliminating commuting benefits the work-life balance. Work dominates the daily routine less and there is also time for private life outside of the weekend. The employees have enough room to develop and thus to adopt a different attitude towards work.
Improvement of Health
The health of your employees can also benefit from remote work. Employees can sleep longer in the morning, as they do not have to commute. Physical activities can also be integrated into the day and a nap after lunch is also possible. Employees with back problems can set up their workplace to meet their needs, for example with a stand-up desk. This can lead to your employees taking fewer sick leaves.Employee Retention and Acquisition of New Employees
By introducing remote work, you improve the work culture in your company and create happier employees. This in turn generates more loyalty and reduces the turnover rate. Of course, working conditions also play a role in recruiting employees. Many employees prefer the flexibility of remote work, giving your company an advantage over the competition.
Lower Environmental ImpactAs a
Greenpeace study
found out, remote work also has a positive impact on our climate. Each year, 5.4 million tons less CO2 could be emitted if 40 percent of employees worked from home at least two days a week. However, this does not apply to digital nomads and traveling remote workers, as they contribute to a high CO2 output, for example through air travel.
The Disadvantages of Remote Work
Remote work is not suitable for every industry and not every employee copes better in the home office. Let's look at the challenges of remote work:Time ManagementIf your employees work from home, they are responsible for managing their own time. This is not easy for everyone at the beginning, as the usual guidelines are missing. However, you can support your employees with workshops on time management.
Less Social Contacts
In the office, employees meet familiar faces with whom they can exchange ideas. When the social component of the office environment disappears, many employees feel isolated. However, this can be mitigated by using
video call tools
.
Impairment of Information Flow
In the office, news and instructions make the round directly, making this more difficult from the home office. To improve remote team work your employees should use
collaboration tools
. These significantly simplify planning, execution and exchange during projects.
Successfully Integrating Remote Work: 7 Tips1. Create the Framework ConditionsThe first step is to determine to what extent remote work should be introduced. For example, it needs to be clarified how many days a week will be worked from home and when employees need to be present. It's important that you find a fixed regulation and communicate it clearly.2. Plan the InfrastructureFor your employees to be able to access all relevant data regardless of their location, you need a decentralized IT infrastructure such as a cloud. You can choose between three cloud models: public cloud, private cloud, and hybrid cloud.
Successfully Integrating Remote Work: 7 Tips1. Create the Framework ConditionsThe first step is to determine to what extent remote work should be introduced. For example, it needs to be clarified how many days a week will be worked from home and when employees need to be present. It's important that you find a fixed regulation and communicate it clearly.2. Plan the InfrastructureFor your employees to be able to access all relevant data regardless of their location, you need a decentralized IT infrastructure such as a cloud. You can choose between three cloud models: public cloud, private cloud, and hybrid cloud.
The former scores with low prices and good scalability. However, with providers outside the EU, you should pay particular attention to data protection. A privately hosted cloud in Germany, on the other hand, offers better protection against cyber-attacks and also complies with GDPR regulations. A hybrid cloud represents a middle way. Here, sensitive data is stored in the private cloud and non-critical files in a public cloud.
3. Take Security Precautions
To ensure your IT security can withstand the new challenges of remote work, you should look at these risks:
Unsecured access to the intranet
Unencrypted video conference tools
Open ports on home office routers
Insufficiently protected private computers
Emergency servers hastily set up during the Corona crisis
- Expired or insufficient VPN licenses
- Company communication not end-to-end encrypted
- Editing rights for critical files not assigned
- 4. The Right SaaS Tool
- For your employees to be able to set up their new workplace uncomplicatedly, you need to decide on a suitable SaaS solution. Thanks to this, all employees have to do is go online, log in, and start working. An example of a high-quality SaaS solution is Microsoft 365. The software suite provides your team with all common office applications and is perfectly tailored to work from home. Also consider that individual departments may require special software.
- 5. Introducing Collaboration Tools
- To maintain the flow of information in the office environment within the home office, collaboration tools are used. They help ensure that your employees are always up to date and no important information is lost. Within the collaboration tools there are subcategories like Video Conferencing, Instant Messaging and Office Suites.
- 6. Set Up a Test Phase
After you have created all the technical prerequisites, you should test how your set-up works in combination. To do this, you should carry out a practical test with a small team and send them to the home office for a certain test period. If there are no complications, you should extend the test to the whole department. Since it is a test phase, you must expect that your employees will have many questions. Therefore, plan capacities for support.
7. Let Communication not be a Stumbling Block
Due to the spatial separation of remote work, communication is exclusively digital. This carries risks such as misunderstandings and interrupted information flow. To avoid these, your employees should use messenger tools all-day. In addition, especially at the beginning, morning calls should be on the agenda.
Which tools are useful for Remote Work?
To ensure the smooth integration of remote work, various tools need to work together. We have therefore compiled the
best collaboration tools
for you, sorted by category:
Instant Messaging Tools
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Video Conferencing Software
Office SuitesCollaboration tools specifically for fostering contact zusammengestellt:
Instant-Messaging-Tools
Slack
Miro
Notion
Asana
Microsoft TeamsVideo-Conferencing-Software
Google Meet
Discord
Stackfield
WebexOffice Suites
Google Workspace
Microsoft 365
ONLYOFFICE
empower
LoomKollaborationstools speziell zur Kontaktförderung
Mystery Minds
DonutAuthor
Tim Fischer
Author
Tim Fischer
Tim ist seit über sechs Jahren als freiberuflicher Journalist und SEO-Autor tätig und schreibt unter anderem für OMR und Netzwelt. Sein Schwerpunkt liegt dabei auf Themengebieten wie Marketing, B2B-Software sowie Consumer-Tech, die er praxisnah und suchmaschinenoptimiert aufbereitet. Damit vermittelt er Leser*innen Orientierung im digitalen Markt und unterstützt sie dabei, die richtigen Tools und Plattformen auszuwählen.
