This report, the fifth edition in the Citi GPS Technology at Work series, looks at how COVID 19 fast-forwarded existing trends and quantifies the possible impact of these trends on the future of work.
Just like that, working from home is a real thing. With the coronavirus spreading, and lockdowns ordered, many office workers suddenly became ‘work from homers’. If you were lucky, you grabbed a few things off your desk on your last day in the office in case you had to work on your laptop from the dining room for a few days. But that turned into a couple of weeks and then a few months. At some point you realized one or two things about working from home – you needed a proper chair and an extra monitor. You also missed your commute as it signified the end of your working day. Now, work and life blend together and somehow it always feels like Tuesday. And that’s before the extra stresses of home schooling, all-thetime family time, and the weekly strategic battle to find a pack of toilet paper.
As lockdowns are slowly lifted and the threat of COVID-19 lessens, questions are being asked around what the work environment will look like post-COVID-19. For some, there’s no question about returning to the workplace. But the workplace is going to be very different in an environment of social distancing. For others, working from home was unexpectedly refreshing and enhanced productivity. In fact, Gallup found three in five U.S. workers who have been doing their jobs from home during the COVID-19 pandemic would prefer to continue to work remotely as much as possible, once restrictions have lifted.