Work-from-Home has always had some benefits for companies. They don’t need to maintain expensive offices. They can hire employees from anywhere. The barrier has usually been that the company hasn’t wanted to make an investment in updating its infrastructure and processes, but many companies have been forced to do this regardless.
Now that some employees are already working from home, what companies are going to be going work-from-home permanently?
Facebook Planning for Permanent WFH
Facebook is already planning for permanent Work-from-Home, and there’s a catch: salaries will now be based on where the person is located. But this could easily become a boon to both the company and its employees. For employees, people from anywhere may now be able to work for big companies like Facebook and Google (if they also adopt the model). For companies, salaries will be able to be paid relative to the individual’s cost of living, greatly reducing the amount of their labor costs.
Facebook has been the target of a number of settlements and legal claims in the past year, the latest of which was a settlement for their content moderators. A reduction in costs could be just what the company needs to create more robust content moderation without having to radically increase its expenses.
Nationwide Transitioning to a Hybrid Model
Nationwide is going to be experimenting with complete Work-from-Home offices, though some of its offices are still going to have office workers. This hybrid model is probably what most companies are going to adopt; while some employees are going to need to be in the office, others can have more remote freedom. Even a year ago, “Work-from-Home” was considered to be a given for executives, managers, and other high-level staff, so many businesses already have protocols in place for this.
Mondelez May Be Cutting Down on Global Offices
Work-from-Home also has some implications for global offices. In the past, many companies established global presences, with offices in other countries. This is costly, but was necessary to support a global clientele. Now these “global” services can be distributed through remote workers rather than physical presences, which is going to reduce costs while making it easier for the company to expand.
Twitter and Square Adopt Permanent Work-from-Home
It makes sense that online services such as Twitter and Square (both with the same CEO, Jack Dorsey) are going to be adopting permanent WFH. Their platforms are already online and therefore there’s no reason for people to have to come into the office. Nevertheless, it’s likely a relief that the announcement has been made, and it makes sense: They’ve already invested in the infrastructure to allow employees to do so.
It’s undoubtedly true that there are some employees who will never be able to work from home. Technicians, factory workers, and other labor-intensive jobs (or fields such as medicine and law) have an undeniably physical component. But a world in which everyone works from home is a world that’s actually better for business in many ways, offloading a lot of the company’s overhead, and improving morale.
