Work from home may be a mixed blessing

Both business and government are starting to worry about the long-term impact of WFH on national productivity.

More than 80 per cent of workers wanted to have the option to work fully or partly from home, according to a recent ACTU survey.

A social media feed replete with pictures of people at the beach is a hallmark of summer. I suspect this summer we’ll see more of those pics appearing midweek as more people avail themselves of the benefits of working from home.

For many, WFH has been a way to stay safe from the coronavirus by reducing physical interaction. For others it has been a boon for work-life balance: more leisure while maintaining the same or greater productivity.

For business and government it’s more of a mixed blessing.

Both are starting to worry about the long-term impact of WFH on national productivity, and the host of untested legal implications for businesses it creates.

It isn’t only indiscreet beach pics on social media that might cause disputes with employers. In October the Fair Work Commission upheld an unfair dismissal case where Allpet, a West Australian-based seller of pet products, fired a worker who vented her frustration on Instagram about Allpet’s WFH policy. The business also learned the employee was operating a private pet-chaperoning and concierge business on the side. The commission found the termination unfair and awarded the employee about $7500 compensation.

Whether employers should snoop on social media is one of many questions in a WFH world. Who is responsible for information technology and security at workers’ homes? Should employers have greater rights to monitor staff location and work habits if they are WFH? Workplace health and safety laws still apply, after all.

In the second half of October, more than 50 per cent of workers in Victoria were working from home at least one day a week, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. In NSW, 44 per cent were WFH at least partly and even 34 per cent in the rest of Australia, where there was practically never any coronavirus.

In NSW a public health order requiring employers to let staff work at home where possible will cease this month. In Victoria, “If you can WFH, you must WFH” remains one of the “six principles of a COVIDsafe workplace”.

Regardless, once all the pandemic restrictions lift it seems demand to WFH will remain.

More than 80 per cent of workers wanted to have the option to work fully or partly from home, according to a recent ACTU survey of 10,000 workers across nine weeks. Another survey by Employment Hero found 84 per cent enjoyed working from home.

In Britain about a fifth of businesses have said they intend to use home working as a permanent business model, according to the Bank of England.

The ACTU is calling for a WFH charter of rights that would include a “right to disconnect”, require employers to pay for extra expenses, provide help with ergonomics and ensure a safe work environment. “There are also potential problems associated with working from home, including the encroachment of work into the personal sphere, increased work-related expenses, feelings of isolation, stress and depression, and other health and safety risks from working in an unsuitable environment, including risks of cyber-bullying and domestic violence,” it says.

Given the popularity of WFH, such problems might be marginal in practice. Yet some workers are expecting a financial dividend.

LinkedIn conducted a survey of more than 6000 people last week where 73 per cent of respondents said employers should pay for all or a percentage of the “additional costs of working from home”. But the savings from WFH for workers, such as reduced transport and clothing costs and commute times, are in most cases greater than any additional costs, such as keeping the airconditioning on a few more hours a day or buying stationery.

Remuneration for white-collar jobs where WFH is relatively easy, in the bureaucracy, professional services and financial services, for instance, easily could fall in the long run. Remote workers might be less valuable to their employers. A salary is not only compensation for discrete output (reports, for instance) but also for what economists might call non-verifiable contributions.

A physical presence in the office makes it easier for managers to communicate with and motivate staff. New staff are likelier to learn in proximity to more experienced workers. And so-called water-cooler moments can build morale and improve productivity as staff mem­bers share ideas. Zoom is no replacement for face-to-face interaction.

Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe opined recently that the pandemic would accelerate productivity growth owing to more rapid digitisation. “Progress that otherwise would have taken years has been made in a matter of months … Digitalisation is not only helping Australians deal with the pandemic but it will also boost productivity and can help drive future economic growth,” he said in a speech last month.

A survey by Boston Consulting Group recently found 75 per cent of workers thought they were more productive at home.

Bank of England chief economist Andrew Haldane suggested in a recent speech we might be less productive at home per hour but we end up putting in more hours.

“Around a third of the time spent commuting has been allocated to increased hours. Assuming an eight-hour working day, that represents a 4 per cent increase in working hours,” he said. “Studies of the length of the working day, measured by the time between the first and last email being sent, point to a larger effect still, with close to an 8 per cent rise in working hours as a result of home working.”

It will take a few years to find out who is right. It seems a stretch, though, to think the productivity benefits of mass WFH have been a rare epiphany, that the virus has opened our eyes to something we couldn’t see a year ago. For all the analysis, in a year there’s a good chance work will look much like it did before the pandemic.