Why Mandatory Work From Home?

Today, our leadership team made the decision to implement a work from home policy for all employees. While we’ve always embraced remote and flexible work as part of our culture, we have taken the additional step to mandate that employees will work remotely, starting next week. 

I wanted to share some of the thinking around this decision, and give other leaders something to chew on as they consider and navigate policies for their own organizations. We didn’t make this decision out of panic, or out of overreaction to misinformation and fear-mongering. We made this decision because we, as a leadership team, feel it is the kindest action we can take for our employees. 

Companies of all sizes, from large enterprises to startups, are drafting policies for remote work related to COVID-19 and, as we read these policies, we noticed that many had one thing in common: they put the onus on the employee to make sound decisions about when to work remotely, and for how long. While we always strive to empower our team members to make good decisions, in this case, we don’t feel like that’s the best call. 

People all over the world are weighing decisions about coming to work, whether it’s because they’re feeling unwell themselves, or they’re concerned about others being unwell. And whether they’re expressing it or not, you too have team members who are concerned about COVID-19, for a variety of reasons. There are many social pressures and concerns that affect how an employee will decide whether to work from home. For example:

• “I’m letting my team down”
• “People will think I’m panicking”
• “I’m scared because I, or someone I care about, is immuno-compromised, but I don’t want to share that/don’t know how to talk about it”
• “What if I make the wrong decision? What if I come to work and I get others sick? What if I don’t come to work and I’m the only one who stayed home?”
• “My manager says I can work from home, but I don’t think she actually means it”

This decision-making process is stressful, and a distraction, and it’s unnecessary to put our team through that. A flexible approach to where and how we work is in our DNA, from the systems and tools we use, to the way we deliver Uvaro training, to Kiite—our own product— which is designed to consolidate knowledge and learnings so that anyone can access them. We are lucky, in this industry and at this company, to already have the tools and infrastructure in place to be able to make a shift to remote work without a significant disruption to our business. And, if you already have the tools and infrastructure in place, I believe you should consider implementing a similar approach. 

If you're debating a similar decision and would like to dig in further to the data and factors we considered, feel free to reach out. I'm at joseph@kiite.ai