Over 74.8 percent respondents agree that they work for extended hours while working from home during the lockdown, according to a survey conducted by ZingHR- a global HR software solution platform. The objective of the survey was to assess how corporate professionals are coping with the challenges of remote working globally. Approximately, 50% of respondents conceded that they are unable to take strategic break during work from home and 34.5% said that it has taken a toll on their physical and mental health.
About 42.8% of women said they are facing challenges in absence of domestic help due to lockdown while 54.6% of the working professionals mentioned that they are not able to manage time at all to pursue their hobbies while working from home.
“Work from home comes with its set of challenges. The survey aimed to gauge the sentiment of corporate professionals towards work- from-home model to enable firms draw strategic insights about the way forward amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings indicate that there is a need for firms to put in place comprehensive guidelines for the work from home model to ensure worklife balance and overall wellness of employees,” said Mr. Prasad Rajappan, CEO, ZingHR.
Though COVID-19 pandemic is a tough time for the entire family, 53.3 % people are getting help by their spouse/ partner in the daily household chores. About 76.3% of the working professionals acknowledged the support of their superiors and teammates during this critical time.
On being asked if they are able to follow a clock-out ritual to compartmentalise their brain while working from home, about 27.3% of them said sometimes and 27.3% said not really sure, 22% said No and rest said Yes.
About 70% of respondents demanded that there should be personalised guidelines by the company in the work from home model for each individual. These guidelines should be gender-neutral giving an equal opportunity to men to help in household chores irrespective of whether they have working or non-working wives. The guidelines need to be general for overall wellness or can be personalized for each employee, agreed by respective managers to boost employee engagement.
The survey was conducted among 300 respondents. Inputs are all by the working professionals. It enlists certain guidelines for employee during work from home by incorporating learnings of respondents. Some of them are as follows-
- The work-life balance must be practised and encouraged
- Manage work timings, automate workflow processes that are manual.
- Keep motivating your employees and appreciate them.
- Open communication between the manager and employee should be there.
- Plan your schedule and try sticking to it. Also, take some momentary rest/activity which can reduce stress instead of working continuously.
- Discover your own peak productivity period and plan your work schedule around it. Make a task list and try sticking to it.