Researchers Give Telecommuting a Thumbs Up

Telecommuting has been a reality in the business world for many years now. And it is becoming more popular every year. With the energy crisis facing the country, more and more firms will be looking to allow employees to work from home at least part of the time. But, does it work?

The latest report from psychologists who used 20 years of research that has been done on the flexible work arrangements of telecommuting, show that it does work, for both the employee and the employer.

They analyzed a total of 46 studies that had a total of 12,833 employees. The results show that telecommuting is beneficial because it gives the employees more control over how they do their work. Telecommuters reported that they were more satisfied with their jobs, were motivated to stay with the employer, experienced less stress, were able to balance work and family time better and got higher ratings from their bosses.

As of 2006, there were an estimated 45 million telecommuters, The researchers defined telecommuting as an alternative working arrangement where the employee does work that is normally performed in the workplace at a different location for at least some part of their schedule and does it by using some form of electronic equipment to communicate with other.

The researchers found that when an employee is given the option to work from home they have more freedom in their work arrangement and removes the worker from direct face to face supervision.

Many still believe that this lack of face to face time with both the supervisors and fellow employees does not make for a good work relationship, but the results of the study showed that the work relations ships did not suffer, except in one particular situation. If the employee worked away from the office at least 3 days a week, they did not have a good relationship with coworkers, but on the other hand their supervisors reported that their work did not suffer from working at home. The telecommunters themselves do not believe that their careers would suffer either.

They put together a profile of the typical telecommuter which is a manager or a professional who is employed in either information technology or sales and marketing, 39 years old and could be either male or female.

Women do especially good as telecommuters. They found that in the samples where there was a greater proportion of women, they received higher scores from the supervisor and their careers benefited.

In short, telecommuting results in autonomy in a positive way, improved work family relationships, job satisfaction, job performance, longevity in the job and less stress.

Source: American Psychological Association (APA) http://newswise.com/