76 Percent of Employees Are More Productive When They Leave the Office
76 Percent of Employees Are More Productive When They Leave the Office
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Want your employees to get more done? Tell them to make themselves scarce. That's the disturbing finding of a new survey by FlexJobs, an online service for professionals seeking flexible or telecommuting jobs.
Of the 2,600 employees who answered the survey, only 24 percent
reported getting their best work done at the office during business
hours. The rest said they were most productive nearly anywhere else.
Fifty percent said they did their best work at home, 12 percent
preferred a coffee shop, library, or other public space over the office,
and 14 percent said they could be productive at the office -- but only
outside business hours, when everyone else was gone.
Why is the office such a bad place to get work done? Survey responses
cited interruptions from co-workers, a distracting atmosphere, office politics,
uncomfortable workspaces, and the stress of commuting. And these are
not mild concerns. Thirty percent of respondents said they'd take a pay
cut of 10 to 20 percent in exchange for outside-the-office work options,
and 42 percent would give up perks to get them.
If you're an employer, this should come as a wakeup call, according to FlexJobs founder Sara Sutton Fell. "Companies should be very
concerned when they hear that employees don't consider their normal
workday in the office to be the best time or place to be productive on
important work projects," she says. "They should take a step back and
evaluate whether their workspaces are really supporting productivity or
hindering it." And, she asks: "Why arbitrarily require people to work
from somewhere that would make them less effective?"
There's a simple answer -- you shouldn't, at least not all the time.
If these survey results worry you (and they should), consider taking
some of these steps:
Create a telecommuting policy.
Allowing people to work from locations outside the office demands more thoughtfulness and better skills from bosses
than the old-fashioned method of "managing by line of sight." But, as
the FlexJobs survey makes clear, it's well worth the effort. If you
don't allow employees to work from home, consider a pilot in which a few
trusted employees work at home just one day a week for a limited
period. That will allow you to try out telecommuting and see for
yourself how it affects productivity.
Offer do-not-disturb workspaces employees can use when they need to concentrate on a project.
With 76 percent of survey respondents citing interruptions from
colleagues, and 74 percent citing distractions in general as
productivity killers, this is a no-brainer. Set aside a conference room,
library, unused office, or other space where employees can go for quiet
and focus.
Rethink your open-plan office.
I know they're popular and can look really cool. And cubicle farms
are considered so 20th century. But neuroscience experts will tell you
that the noise and constant distractions destroy
concentration, efficiency, and even brain function. Having spent time
working in the original open-plan office, a newspaper newsroom, I have
to agree.
Look for ways they can avoid the commute.
There's
little to love and a lot to hate about the rush-hour drive to and from
work in most American cities. It degrades the environment, raises
people's stress levels
before they even arrive at work, and perhaps worst of all, takes up at
least an hour a day of what could otherwise be productive time.
So help yourself and your employees by letting them avoid it. Adjust
your office hours, consider a four-day work week with longer days to
eliminate one commuting day, let employees work from home for part of
the day or the week, or allow them to use co-work locations nearer their
homes.
Make your office healthier.
Eighty percent of respondents believed working away from the office
would make them healthier, and 29 percent said exercise was an important
reason they wanted to work from home. With these findings in mind, it's
a good idea to make the office into a more health-supportive
environment, whether or not you allow employees to telecommute.
Consider bringing in healthy snacks or even a juice bar, on-site yoga
classes, and/or fitness challenges, installing exercise equipment or
offering memberships at low or no cost at a nearby gym. And while you're
at it, review your office ergonomics to ensure that
employees' workspaces support maximum health. Your employees shouldn't
have to choose between coming to work and feeling their best.
The opinions expressed here by Inc.com columnists are their own, not those of Inc.com.
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