Asking about the benefits of remote work after over two years of pandemics almost feels like a joke. From better productivity to a lack of commute or flexible schedule, most employees prefer hybrid or remote work arrangements.
But is it the same for employers? Shifting to remote work arrangements was a challenge during the pandemic. However, distributed teams brought numerous advantages to employers. So, which are the top remote work benefits?
How Can Remote Work Benefit Your Business?
To answer this question, let’s go over stats and survey from different employers worldwide:
- According to Owl’s State of Remote Work, medium and small companies are 2 times more likely to hire full-time remote team members: Especially for startups and small businesses, remote recruitment is an effective strategy to optimize hiring costs to direct the budget and investment on project operations and quality products.
- 85% of managers believe that hybrid and remote teams will become the normal work arrangement in the next few years: Even if the pandemic was a challenge for many companies transitioning to remote work, 6 in 7 managers still believe that hybrid workplace structures are the future.
- 64% of recruiters confirm that work-from-home policy helps find high-quality talent: After the pandemic, most employees prefer remote work options. Therefore, companies offering hybrid and remote options have more chances to attract high-skilled candidates.
- 94% of surveyed employers report better performance and higher productivity: Company managers and employers noticed a even (67%) or even better (27%) levels of productivity after work from home shift.
- 74% of workers say that remote work options are crucial to increase employee retention: So, a flexible working schedule and virtual team are an effective strategy to improve your company’s employee rendition – just consider that already in 2017, companies with remote work options saw a 50% decrease in resignations.
What to Consider Before Turning To Remote Placement?
To get all the benefits of remote placement, the first thing to do is to prepare your team for the transaction:
- Tech comes first: Remote work means using tech equipment. So, the first step is to provide your team members with the tools and software they will need to use daily.
- Prioritize communication: The second step is to organize your communication channels and internal documentation. Depending on your team members’ location, be very clear about synchronous or asynchronous communication to ensure a smooth and transparent workflow.
- Work-life balance: Unlike the office, you can allow a certain degree of flexibility in your teamwork schedule – according to deadlines and deliveries.
- Regular check-ins: Depending on your team size, it’s essential to arrange individual and group regular check-ins to bring the team together.
- Remote work policies: Finally, define your remote work policy. They can be adjusted on the go, but provide guidelines to your team members about communications, time schedule, deliveries, etc.
6 Benefits of Remote Work for Employers
- Cost savings
- Environmental impact
- Mental health
- Multiple Time Zones
- Employee retention
- Talent Pool
1. Cost Savings
Remote businesses can save company costs on office rent and salaries. According to Global Workplace Analytics Telework Savings Calculator, a company can save $11,000 per part-time remote worker annually.
However, remote employees don’t mean zero costs for employers. These are the main areas where remote work can be an effective strategy to optimize your company costs:
- Real estate, office, and cleaning services: The first costs employers can cut down with distributed teams are real estate costs, utility bills, furniture, etc. – almost $18,000/year.
- Food: In the same vein, without a physical working space, you can save budget for work lunches, office snacks, supplies for meetings, and catering agencies for special events.
- Travel expenses: Before the pandemic, employers paid an average of $1,293 for travel expenses and business trips for employees. With hybrid and remote arrangements, companies save on daily expenses, optimizing the costs for important trips.
- Software, tech tools, data security: Finally, virtual teams need quality tech equipment working from home. Providing your team members with the necessary tools and software is more affordable than setting up an office. Although, this is the only area where it’s crucial to invest your money wisely. It’s better to spend more budget on tech tools initially to set up a smooth workflow than providing cheap working tools that you will need to constantly replace.
2. Environmental Impact
According to a recent FlexJobs report, one of the top remote work benefits is the environmental impact. As the report states, 3.9 million part-time remote employees would reduce gas emissions of 600,000 cars yearly. In addition, if 36.2 million Americans will be working remotely by 2025, gas emissions would go down by 70 to 140 billion every year.
3. Mental Health
Mental health and remote work are hot topics after the pandemic. However, with a structured remote work policy, employees are generally more satisfied.
In the FlexJobs’ 10th Annual Survey, 70% of respondents confirm the positive impact of remote work on their mental health: 48% for the better work-life balance; 54% because of the emotional support they get at work; and 45% for the flexible schedule.
Finally, a CNBC | SurveyMonkey Workforce Survey found that remote workers reported a Workforce Happiness Index score of 75 out of 100 – compared to 71 out of 100 for in-office workers.
4. Multiple Time Zones
Especially for tech and customer service businesses, distributed teams are an effective strategy to keep 24/7 high-quality service. Hiring worldwide, you can organize your team workflow based on different time zones, ensuring quality service at any time.
5. Employee Retention
Most employees prefer to work remotely. For example, Harvard Business Review published a well-known study about virtual teams. According to their findings, remote workers are more productive, work overtime, and tend to stay longer with a company. For 75% of people, working from home means fewer distractions and more flexibility, reducing daily stress (86%).
What do these numbers mean for employers? Simple, remote work is an effective way to attract better candidates and keep them in your company. According to different studies worldwide, remote work reduces employee turnover rate by 25-50%. Most workers tend to be more loyal with a flexible schedule (81%), and tend to be more satisfied than office colleagues (57% vs. 50%).
6. Talent Pool
Finally, the top benefit of remote work is a wider talent pool. But which are the real benefits of hiring candidates from all over the world?
- Inclusion and diversity: Distributed teams allows creating an inclusive and diverse work environment. For example, LGBTQ+ workers often feel exhausted from hiding their sexual orientation (17%) or gender identity (13%) in the office space. The same goes for different cultures, religions, and minorities. Remote work allows creating an inclusive workplace where people can show their differences bringing different perspectives to the team.
- International talent: Remote hiring allows managers to hire international talent, with experiences in different companies and local contexts. For example, your business involves global customer service. You can hire local employees dealing with requests already familiar with local laws and policies.
- Specialized skills: Finally, remote hiring allows a selection of candidates targeting specific skills. For example, C+ developers are mainly based in South America, or Eastern Europe is a tech hub growing faster than ever. Based on the specific needs of your project, you can hire ad hoc candidates to fulfill your needs.
How Does DistantJob Choose The Top Talent for Remote Jobs?
A wider talent pool is certainly one of the best benefits of hiring remotely. But it’s also the biggest challenge. Not only will you compete with thousands of companies. Screening international CVs is challenging for smaller HR teams. At DistantJob, we develop an effective hiring process after over a decade of activities in the remote recruitment tech field:
- International talent: Our recruitment team is spread worldwide. They can direct tap into the global market to propose you pre-vetted candidates matching your project needs, communication levels, and quality standards.
- Competitive salaries: Hiring remotely allows you to add to your payroll high-skilled talents without paying stellar salaries. Where living costs are more affordable, you can hire certified developers offering competitive salaries to build a long-term work relationship bringing value to your company in the long run.
- Legal requirements: Finally, remote hiring is a challenge for HR teams, balancing between international contracts and local labor laws. Our HR team takes care of all the paperwork for you. In addition, they oversee the onboarding process and keep regular contacts with developers to check everything is set and ready.
With this system, we can guarantee you all the benefits of remote work. Here are three steps inspired by our recruitment team to hire the best developers worldwide:
1. Job Description
Writing the job description is the most important part of the hiring process. You should list tasks and responsibilities as precisely as you can. Finally, specify the company’s goals and type of work arrangement you are offering:
- Outsourcing Company: You seek an external development company to run specific stages of a development project, like data storing or front-end applications.
- Freelance: You need a freelance-based collaboration for smaller maintenance tasks or for a temporary project.
- Full-Time: You want to hire a remote developer full-time because you are looking for a reliable and talented team member to grow with your company and team.
2. Technical Skill Tests
Technical skills tests are a valuable tool to visualize in a candidate:
- Professional method and quality of the coding process.
- Balance between syntax (how to write code) and back-end-related issues (what to write).
- No longer one/two hours.
- Test difficulty needs to match the candidates’ abilities.
- Relevant resources the candidate accesses like libraries, frameworks, and other tools to improve the development process.
3. Interview Rounds
Hiring Node.js experts means finding a talented candidate able to take care of multiple back-end tasks. Especially when you hire a remote Node.js developer, you should arrange a round of interviews to test communication skills and technical proficiency. Finally, it’s important to arrange an interview with other team members to test interpersonal skills and personalities.
Last Thoughts About Benefits Of Remote Work
Remote hiring can be a game-changer for your business if you do it right! We are always here to help. We truly believe in the importance of building a collaborative productive team leaving flexibility and independence to our team members. That’s why we are so good at spotting future team members for our clients! So, you can just focus on your project, hiring the best candidates worldwide, and enjoy the benefits of remote work!
