GitLab’s latest report shows how the pandemic accelerated the trend towards workplace flexibility.
Image: iStock / Fizkes
Within three months, the DevOps platform GitLab surveyed professionals worldwide to collect data for their latest report, “Out of the Office: How the World Has Adapted to Remote Work in 2020,” and on GitLabs “The Remote Work Report : The Future “Update of Work is Remote” which launched in March 2020.
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The release of the first remote report unexpectedly coincided with the closure of most of the company due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Depending on how you look at it, timing was either a good thing (detailed research on remote working) or a bad thing (since so many employees were quickly becoming remote workers, new developments, challenges, and technologies could make the report obsolete). Within a year, GitLab checked the ratings of more than 3,000 respondents.
SEE: CompTIA’s 10 Trends for 2021. # 1: There’s no such thing as normal. (TechRepublic)
For its latest version – How the World Adjusted to Remote Working in 2020 – GitLab surveyed more than 200 professionals worldwide, with most (86%) working in areas that worked remotely over a three-month period are suitable. The surveys were carried out by telephone, video conference or written questionnaire.
“The impact of COVID-19 may have accelerated the adoption of remote working for many businesses, but trends toward connectivity and increasingly digital work have laid the foundation for businesses to be successful so quickly,” said Sid Sijbrandij, CEO and Co-founder of GitLab said in a press release. “In the future, remote work will no longer be seen as an advantage, but as a lifestyle requirement.”
Expectations, according to the new report, have rapidly changed standard expectations, and both employers and employees began to see and discover how to optimize productivity at (for) work and throughout their lives.
25 percent of respondents said “more time” is the benefit they enjoy the most because they work remotely. Very few have optimized their living situation to save money (12%), create better living conditions (9%), or be more productive (12%), and GitLab said this suggests that this is “not a serious concern Regarding Telework “are.
More than half (56%) of respondents switched to remote working during the pandemic, and only 1% said they would like to return to the office. Due to the unprecedented length of the pandemic, which is still fraught with uncertainty, employees now “identify” as remote workers. Identity is crucial to develop motivation, “to improve language skills and use workflows that strengthen distributed teams”. Remote workwork is a mainstay among freelancers, creatives and entrepreneurs and has now been “democratized” and integrated into the mainstream of companies.
The most important criteria cannot be found in an office: Almost half (47%) identified nature / outdoor space as a priority; 34% said it was the value of “comfortable surroundings”; and 25% said family connections are important. Remote work has triggered a kind of wanderlust or at least a desire (under 28%) to get closer to nature, warmer weather or a better community.
A common theme in the new research is: “Far is not the future of work, but the future of life”. 37% of the respondents said they had optimized their life to spend time with the family. 30% prioritize nature or exercise or health and 26% optimize schedules in order to “regain more time in a day”. As it turned out, remote work makes everyday life easier to manage.
Employees want flexibility, solid communication, and trust that they can do their jobs and meet deadlines. Personal politics play less of a role in praise and promotion, and clocking in and clocking out times become less and less relevant as long as the work is completed as expected. Remote working has had a positive effect on teamwork (65%).
Work and life boundaries are a complicated challenge, said respondents (22% said they didn’t have a specific room in their home to do their remote work) who gave advice to job seekers looking for a remote place to work; 77% focused the answers on four key areas: setting boundaries (25%), staying focused and productive (20%), protecting mental and physical health (23%), and putting personal priorities first (9%).
Remote working is a great incentive and “boon for retention” as 74% of respondents said they are either “somewhat” or “very” likely to stay with their current employer “because of remote working support”. Given that many employers struggle with top tech professionals who often leave after their first or second year, this is good news for business leaders.
And yet, 57% said they missed social interactions, which are crucial in a personal workplace.
“Throughout modern history, we have adjusted life to the rigid boundaries of work,” said Darren Murph, director of remote at GitLab, in the same press release. “When remote working is understood as a competitive strategy, work complements life with greater harmony. As expressed in this report, more and more companies are realizing this reality and thinking differently about the decoupling of geography and results.”
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