Article | Work From Home
WFH: The new
Urban Work Culture
W
hile the world can only guess when the pandemic will come to an end, many white collared workers are already predicting the new office routine. With companies forced to keep their employees home, everyone has gotten clarity on a few things. As soon as the pandemic driven lockdown is relaxed and everyone gets back to their routine of travelling to the office daily, some might stay home and work from there. This ‘work from home’ culture is now being defined as the new normal for many industries and opening opportunities for many to work in a global market. But the new culture in which we all are trying
34 May 2020 | www.urbanupdate.in
to blend in has its own complexities.
All that glitters is not gold!
The work from home culture is now being seen by many individuals as a new way forward to work in the globally digitalised world. Where many individuals are now able to give more time to their families, they are also saving up on the cost of commute financially and otherwise. Even some large multinationals and earlystage start-ups are looking at it as a way of cost-cutting. However work from home which is seen by many individuals as beneficial has created health problems for some. A 2019 survey by Airtasker revealed that 54 per cent of remote workers felt “overly stressed” and 45 per cent “experienced high levels of anxiety”
during the workday. Before the pandemic, people working in offices had fixed hours of work; as the clock hit a particular time, it was a signal for pack up, which means shutting down your computers, leaving the work desk and going back home. Working from home has taken away that demarcation, and employees feel they are working 24x7 at home. While many large corporations like Twitter, Facebook, and JP Morgan have begun to introduce new HR policies for work from home, some have shown their concern for the employees’ health and well-being if work from home continues even after the lockdown. Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft has warned that permanent work from home can have serious consequences on employee health and company culture. Nadella
