Work From Home: Benefits, Challenges, and the Rise of the Hybrid Model

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Work from home, also known as working remotely, is a form of employment that does not require employees to clock in every morning at the office; they work outside the normal office environment using the internet and a computer to talk with their team.

Working from home has become a dream mode of employment for everyone. People don’t like to wake up every morning just to prepare for work in order to leave their homes at early hours of the morning, just to meet up on time, especially when they stay far from their workplace and also in an area with high traffic congestion.

People who have had an experience with remote work never want to take a job that requires them to appear physically at work; rather than going to work physically, they would rather work remotely.

Working from home has made work very flexible; it has also reduced costs for employees since physical presence is not required. It tends to help the employee redirect costs for transportation fare, lunch money, and clothing into different expenditures or even savings.

Working from home helps save time used to commute to work, ensuring job satisfaction, especially for those living far from their workplace, reducing one to two hours of commute time daily. Working from home also allows an individual to live far from their workplace without worries of daily commute time to work as a result of the distance.

Working from home became popular during the outbreak of corona virus in the late 2019 and early 2020, when, to prevent the virus from spreading, they decided that people who can render their services online could stay home and work in order to reduce physical contact with the rest of the world.

Employers have also taken advantage of the work-from-home opportunities; it helps employers’ safe cost in terms of overheads, spending little to nothing on office supplies, rentals, utilities and office maintenance.

While it entails some benefits for both the employer and the employee, some of the challenges for employers are that it becomes more difficult for employers to monitor and supervise their staff working online since it only requires an online presence; an individual could simply log in to be visible online, or assign their task to a third person while they engage in other things.

Another challenge is that it isolates workers from each other, which affects proper bonding with other staff members of the organisation.

There is also the limitation of working from home, where it does not apply to every industry like healthcare, manufacturing and other job roles that require presence.

While all the above points are valid, the midpoint between working from home and onsite work is a mix of both; companies have started introducing a hybrid model, which requires employees to be present for a specific number of days in a week to show up at the office, while the remaining days, the employee gets to work from home. This will help solve the challenges that may come with working from home and ensure that it survives the test of time.

My name is @rishagamo, and this is my response to the Hive Learners weekly featured prompt, week 230, episode 01: “WORK FROM HOME”.

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