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The Covid-19 pandemic forced us to work in a different way as we were used to. IT departments running overtime to enable employees to work from home, installing tools, HR departments writing ‘working from home’ policies, adjusting standardized ways of working and employees attempting to reach the productivity they had prior to working from home. In other words, a lot had to be done and a lot has happened since the start of the pandemic.

Now that the majority of the working population is working from home, more research regarding the impact that working from home has can be done. Logically, there are less costs since travel is no longer necessary. To provide some numbers, by increasing the time working from home for one day per week, the net benefit amounts to 3.9 billion euro annually. This benefit is mainly driven by the reduction in costs. Additionally, CO2 emissions will also reduce with this change. Again, for one day working at home, CO2 emissions could reduce by 605.5 million kgs annually. (PWC, 2020)

Evidently, this has a positive impact. Not only on the costs made for the company, but also on the environment by reducing traffic emissions which on the long term might be even more important. Unfortunately, there is another side to this story.

Looking ahead, results might prove to be less beneficial as they are on the short term. For instance, factors that are key drivers for success in companies such as innovations, working closely together and sharing insights and knowledge, are all (for now at least) reliant on the proximity to one another (PWC, 2020). With the current changes in our normal way of working, these factors are in jeopardy. Companies should investigate the impact working from home has on their workforce and identify whether or not actions have to be taken to assure the continuity of these factors as they were in the ‘old days’.

From my point of view, these factors are all part of the culture of a company, alongside many other factors ofcourse. So to state it differently, the culture of a company on the long term is in jeopardy as well. A lot of reasearch has been done on the subject of company culture and its effects, although, I believe there is an aspect that has been given little attention thus far due to all the implemented changes. Yet this aspect of company culture is vital for the endurance of companies. This aspect considers new employees entering companies during the Covid-19 pandemic.

In most cases, the new employees start working from home as soon as possible. Apart from emails and calls from time to time, direct contact with colleagues is limited. This contact, especially in the early period, facilitates expectation-setting. BB. If a new employee spends most of his time around his colleagues, ‘observing’ their behavior and picking up signals, the new employee is more easily able to get a grip on their standards of communication and performance. Additionally, workplace engagement has a strong relationship with social interactions, which, again, currently is limited. Workplace engagement is strongly related to the quality of work, job engagement and employee well-being. All these factors contribute towards job satisfaction which is crucial to have nowadays. (Coworking Resources, 2019)

Evidently, the way an employee starts his/her job is of paramount importance for his/her perspective on the company and the way he/she is moving forward in it. This foundation-laying is currently endangered due to the lack of social interactions and less contact with colleagues. Perhaps it’s time to change the social dynamics of the online workplace for new employees so that they’re able to become part of the companies’ culture and eventually turn into a promotor instead of just a new addition to the workforce.

The options available to tackle this upcoming issue and embed these options into a companies’ digital strategy are endless, however, awareness of the problem is of paramount importance right now. Start the talk, consider the needs and aid the workforce!

References:

Coworking Resources. (2019, March 15). The Negative Effects of Working From Home on Company Culture. Retrieved October 9, 2020, from https://www.coworkingresources.org/blog/the-negative-effects-of-working-from-home-on-company-culture

PWC. (2020). The costs and benefits of working from home. Retrieved October 9, 2020, from https://www.pwc.nl/nl/actueel-publicaties/assets/pdfs/pwc-the-costs-and-benefits-of-working-from-home.pdf

 

 

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Last night, the first official “face-off” between Republican Donald Trump and Democratic Joe Biden in the traditional Presidential Debate took place. I do not recommend someone watching it as naming it a debate would be a compliment. As Green (2020) would describe it: “What might possibly have been an interesting and even educational exchange turned out to be a distressing and largely unwatchable pissing contest.” With an overload of insults, lies and shallow comments, the two presidential candidates who will have the task of running this immense country seemed more like two children fighting over toys. As entertaining as this may be, it also makes me wary, as this is what campaigning in the US is mostly about right now, throwing dirt at each other to improve their own position at the voters.

Currently, political polarization is growing. This becomes evident by the statistics found by Gilberstadt (2020). This may be due to the fact that one candidate is better at insulting than the other candidate is, however, there is a tool that stimulates this growth in polarization. Online users are prone to searching information that aligns with their beliefs, forming and joining groups that have the same values and perspectives on matters, e.g. echo chambers. Algorithms on social media stimulate this process by promoting content based on user preferences, limiting information that might oppose the users’ beliefs. Bessi A, Zollo F, Del Vicario M, Puliga M, Scala A, Caldarelli G, et al. (2016)

To illustrate this, a Democratic political video appeared on my Facebook that, you guessed it, threw dirt at Trump. Kind of amused since I’m not a huge Trump fan I watched it and moved on. Then to my surprise, over the next weeks, I got overloaded with Democratic videos about why Trump slacks as a president, stimulating an even more one-sided perspective on Trump. The most worrying aspect of this process to me was that aside from me disliking Trump even more, I favored Biden more to be the next president, without knowledge of any of his plans!

Now imagine living in the US where there is a clear division in population and what party they support. This political preference is increasingly more based around videos that illustrate why one candidate is unfit to rule. So, what happens if voters are prone to vote for a candidate based on how good they are at insulting the other party? The result of this trend was never so obvious, just take a look at the presidential debate of last night. This trend is worrying and simultaneously saddening to witness. Now I don’t know what steps are necessary to take, but I do believe social media platforms need to address the issue of echo chambers. Provide voters with information from opposing sides as well as this would slow down the trend of “voting for the better insulter” and perhaps the political debate will be made less superficial as it is now!

Bessi A, Zollo F, Del Vicario M, Puliga M, Scala A, Caldarelli G, et al. (2016) Users Polarization on Facebook and Youtube. PLoS ONE 11(8): e0159641. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0159641

Gilberstadt, H. (2020, September 10). Voters’ Attitudes About Race and Gender Are Even More Divided Than in 2016. Retrieved September 30, 2020, from https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2020/09/10/voters-attitudes-about-race-and-gender-are-even-more-divided-than-in-2016/

Green, L. (2020, September 30). Trump v Biden in the first 2020 presidential debate: our panelists’ verdict. Retrieved September 30, 2020, from https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/29/first-2020-presidential-debate-our-panelists-verdict