The greater prevalence of teleworkers within a department or a division may have a negative effect on job satisfaction among workers who don't telecommute, says Timothy Golden, an associate professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York.
"I wanted to try to better understand the broader implications of telework that go beyond the teleworkers themselves," says Golden, who has been studying flexible work modes and teleworkers for over a decade. He also points out that there's not much research investigating the impact of telework on those who remain in the office.
The company Golden studied had a telework program in which nearly 30% of its workforce participated. The program was a voluntary initiative provided to nearly all employees as a means of improving quality of life and alleviating conflicts between work and family. Managers were curious about how the program affected the rest of the company's workforce.
In the study, all respondents had at least a bachelor's degree, 55% were female, and the average age was 37. Drawing randomly from professional-level workers across the company, the final sample represented the responses of 42% of workers who did not telework, but work with telecommuters.
Analyzing the responses of these workers, Golden found that those who don't telecommute may find their work less fulfilling because of increased obstacles to establishing and maintaining effective and rewarding relationships with their teleworking colleagues.
Moreover, some nonteleworkers think they have less flexibility and a higher workload when their colleagues are working at home. What's more, they may be frustrated by coordinating work in an environment with extensive teleworking, he explains.
Golden realizes, however, that other variables influence job satisfaction and employee retention among nonteleworkers. For example, he notes the amount of time co-workers telework, the extent of face-to-face interactions and the amount of job autonomy given to employees are also influential factors.
Still, he advises managers to create greater face-to-face contact between co-workers when employees are in the office and allow greater job autonomy to accomplish work activities as employees see fit.
Employers need "to take into account the broader impact of telework on others in the office, particularly within team-based work environments, and exercise caution when implementing or expanding this work mode based purely on individual desires to telework," Golden says.
Based on the research, employers may be able to mitigate any adverse consequences of teleworking in terms of the satisfaction levels of those co-workers in the office by enabling those in the office to have more job autonomy or discretion in completing job tasks.
In addition, organizations should determine if turnover among non-teleworkers has increased since implementing a telework program.
Survey nonteleworkers to find out what they really think about the program and those who telecommute, says Golden. "Any informed manager needs to consider the full range of impacts that any decisions or change in work modes might have."
The proper hook up
It's key that employers leverage advance communication technology so that nonteleworkers and teleworkers can properly connect, says William Mularie, chief executive office of the Telework Consortium, a Virginia-based group advising private and pubic sector employers on telework programs.
"To me, the quality of the teamwork and the interaction among the work groups, whether they're remote or in the fixed office, depends on the advance communication technology the employer utilizes," he says.
If the technology is there to sustain office communication, it doesn't matter whether workers commute to an office or they are remote. If you don't have socialization, the physical separation is harming, Mularie contends.
"When you start a teleworking program, clearly the teleworkers must be trained, but also their in-office counterparts have to be trained as well, in terms of what it actually means to telework," says Cindy Auten, general manager of Telework Exchange. The Virginia-based group works with public and private firms on telecommuting policies.
"There are many misperceptions out there from people who have not been exposed to telework before," Auten explains. "From an employer perspective, you need to test the teleworking program, setting up performance metrics showing what it is actually doing for the company and how it is affecting employees."
"The whole idea is to keep the lines of communication open," she says. This includes letting the colleagues of teleworkers express not only how well the teleworkers are performing, but also their opinions about the program.
