Yahoo and Hewlett-Packard CEOs Marissa Mayer and Meg Whitman have faced criticism for their decisions to limit employees from working at home, which seems ironic coming from tech firms led by women, a demographic often eager to have the option of telecommuting in order to achieve a better work-home balance.

Each chief had her reasons for retracting telecommuting options at her respective organization, but are those reasons good enough? To many, Mayer and Whitman’s decision to restrict telecommuters seems a step backwards in our very mobile era, where the cloud empowers many employees to be just as productive away from their desks.

At present, about 10 percent of the U.S. workforce already works from home at least once a week, with 4.3 percent working at most of the week. But is this really a productivity booster for the company? Or does working at home leave employees to neglect their duties?

Give employees the choice

In a study published last February, it was determined by Stanford researchers with the aid of CTrip employees, that some people perform better when they work at home, while others do better when they work in actual offices. Which means that, while working at home is not for everyone, it is something companies should consider if they want to boost employees’ productivity.

Stanford researchers conducted a study among CTrip employees. CTrip is a travel agency in Shanghai, China, with 16,000 employees. Some of CTrip’s call center employees volunteered for the study, which lasted nine months. The researchers monitored the performance of the employees in the office, as well as those who volunteered to work at home.

The study showed that employees working at home experienced a 13 percent performance increase, of which about 9 percent was from working more minutes per shift related to fewer shift breaks and sick-days, and 4 percent from more calls per minute attributed to a quieter working environment.

Those who volunteered to work at home reported improved work satisfaction and experience less turnover, but they also felt that the chance of getting a promotion decreased since they were isolated from other employees.

CTrip was pleased with the outcome and rolled-out the option of working from home to the whole company. Surprisingly, half of those who volunteered to work at home chose to switch back to working from the office again. Those who chose to stay working at home were the employees who performed best in the home environment.

This study showed how the decision to work from home is best determined case-by-case. Some people are more productive when no one is disturbing them while others welcome the occasional cubicle visitor, bathroom breaks, lunch breaks with colleagues etc.

Why decide?

Companies are so afraid that employees who work from home aren’t really working, but how sure are they that all those working in the office are really putting in 100 percent effort? There are office employees who appear to be busy working, but at the end of the day they were the least productive in terms of output.

Giving employees the flexibility to choose whether to work at home or in the office can boost their productivity, plus it can even reduce office costs by as much as $2,000 per month.

Ordered back to the office during times of innovation

Yahoo and HP have allowed some of their employees to work at home, but have since pulled that plug, as both companies attempt to resurrect the business under new leadership.

• Mayer’s ironic story

Around the same time the aforementioned study was published, Yahoo ordered employees to stop working at home and go back to working in the office, citing “face-to-face interaction among employees fosters a more collaborative culture,” as the main reason for abolishing work at home.

According to John Challenger, chief executive of Challenger Gray & Christmas, an outplacement and executive coaching firm, the greatest fear of employers in allowing employees to work at home partially or full time is that they might lose control. He added that if companies want innovation, then face-to-face interaction is needed, but if they want employees to be more productive, then working at home is their best option.

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer was certainly chastised when she abolished the option of working at home. Ruth Rosen, a professor emerita of women’s history at the University of California, stated that “the irony is that [Mayer] has broken the glass ceiling, but seems unwilling for other women to lead a balanced life in which they care for their families and still concentrate on developing their skills and career.”

• Whitman’s tale of circumstance

Though Mayer was criticized for this move, it seems HP’s CEO Meg Whitman is following her lead. But unlike Yahoo, working from home wasn’t completely abolished for HP employees, but the company will be more strict in gauging which employees should be allowed to work remotely. The irony here, of course, is that HP is in the business of selling devices and services that empower telecommuters across the globe.

When asked whether it was true that HP was tightening its policies when it comes to working at home, an HP representative stated:

“Over the past several years, HP has been focused on developing workplaces that attract employees to the office and encourage effective and collaborative work. Our investments in real estate and IT infrastructure have made it possible to now accommodate more employees in the office and also support new styles of working which we believe will further HP’s business strategies and objectives. Flexibility continues to be a core operating principle at HP.”

In the office for Collaboration

So what brought about Whitman’s aforementioned decision regarding employees who work at home?

It isn’t a secret that the company has been struggling to get back on its feet, and it didn’t help that Whitman had to iron out all the kinks left by her predecessor. And with the mobile industry gnawing on the PC business, HP is really taking a hit. Plus the fact that HP was removed from the Dow Jones Industrial Average about a month ago, things have really turned sour for the company.

“I hope that every HP employee took today’s announcement personally,” Whitman said in the one-page internal memo on September 10.

She called the Dow incident as “a blow to our brand” and stated that all of them need to make every sale.

photo credit: citrixonline via photopin cc

photo credit: citrixonline via photopin cc

photo credit: mccun934 via photopin cc