Nearly 60% of managers had an improved perception of working from home after live agents were forced to following the pandemic.
Research from Metrigy has found that a staggering 56.3% of business leaders and management now feel comfortable with the prospect of remote working post-pandemic.
The survey asked managers how COVID changed the viability of remote working for them. 56.3% said their perspective had improved, 21.7% said there was no change in their option on working from home, 20.1% said it had worsened and 1.9% said they were unsure.
Robin Gareiss, Metrigy CEO, said: “For years, many business leaders have been hesitant about allowing employees to work from home. In some cases, they didn’t trust that they would do their work–or at least not as productively as they do in the office. In other cases, they did not understand how collaboration technology would work.
“In fact, many doubted the effectiveness of video conferencing, the quality of home-office connectivity and security, and the value of team collaboration channels. If it weren’t for the pandemic, the work-from-home naysayers likely would never have experienced it.
“Once they did, however, the majority became convinced that work-from-home can, in fact, improve employee productivity. And they were in many cases blown away by how effective collaboration applications were at bringing teams together and enabling effective management.”
The findings come as it was revealed that most live agents will be offered a working from home programme on a permanent basis following the COVID-19 pandemic.
21.4% of agents will work remotely permanently while others will work from the office on a full time basis, a second poll from Metrigy found.
15.4% will be offered a hybrid working model, which includes working from home some days and travelling into the office at other times and 17.3% of agents will now work from home indefinitely.
Metrigy also reported a 33% spike in the number of agents working from home.
The survey polled 524 participants from 10 countries and was featured in Metrigy’s Workforce Engagement & Optimisation 2021- 22 research study conducted April 2022.
It followed news more than a third of commuters said they would quit their job if businesses forced them back into the office on a full time basis.
