Flexibility is fine, but it’s not a case of one-size-fits-all
Glenn Dutcher – Assistant Professor of Economics, Ohio University
Any flexible working strategy is going to have trade-offs. The key thing to consider is the current environment and the tasks a company is asking its employees to perform. Aligning a flexible working strategy against the different categories of asks will allow companies to build a more effective working arrangement. Here are the key points to consider:
Is home working appropriate for the nature of the task in hand?
Is the task mundane or creative? And is it being performed alone or in a team? Previous research that looked at the effect of the environment on individual performance suggests people perform mundane tasks better within a cubicled office environment. On the other hand, remote workers are around 25% more productive when it comes to creative tasks.
This makes intuitive sense. If a task is mundane, you need some structure,…