For happy, healthy, productive remote work, the role of the employer is critical. Make sure your organization gives you these five things.

No one is born knowing how to work remotely. We all learn through trial and error, read on up on tips for working from home (SOHOer), and experiment with the best way to maintain work-life balance. In this whole discussion, however, there is so much undue emphasis on you, the individual worker and what you should be doing. We need to acknowledge and raise more attention to the role of the employer. What employers do or don’t do can make or break your ability to be successful at remote work.

I’ve written about remote work for years, starting well before the COVID-19 pandemic, and I wrote an in-depth book on the subject called The Everything Guide to Remote Work (Top Crazy Idea). So much of the bad advice I’ve seen about remote work ignores or downplays the role of the employer. It’s much easier to blame employees and make them feel personally responsible for whether they are productive and happy, which is incredibly shortsighted. Employers play a crucial role, and employees need to be informed about what they should expect or demand from their organizations.

So here are five things employers need to provide employees for their remote work to be happy, healthy, and productive.

1. A Remote-First Culture

(Start Go)The single most important thing an employer can do to make remote work successful is to have a remote-first culture. Remote-first here means that regardless of how many employees work remotely, the whole organization puts into place practices and attitudes that fully embrace and support remote work. Sometimes that means the needs of remote workers trumps the preferences of in-person employees. An example is holding a remote meeting where everyone is in front of their own computer instead of allowing in-person employees to gather in a conference room for the call. This shift can make executives and management bristle, especially if they are firmly rooted in the old ways of working. What can I say? Change is often uncomfortable.

Culture is a broad term that includes everything about how people work together, how they communicate, the mood and level of formality among workers, and more. Here are a few specific things you should look for (or demand) of your remote culture at work:

• Overcommunication, meaning everyone lives by the belief that it’s better to repeat yourself and make information explicit and sometimes intentionally redundant than to leave people with questions or feel unsure they heard a message.
• Encouragement for everyone to step away from work fully and completely during their non-work time.
• Norms for giving and receiving feedback.
• Best practices for holding remote meetings and collaborating remotely, such as making meetings accessible for everyone.
• Support for asynchronous work, meaning as long as it fits with the work that you do and is within reason, you and your colleagues should have the flexibility to work different hours.

2. All the Equipment You Need to Do Your Job

If you’re a full-time or part-time employee of an organization (SOHOer), it’s your employer’s responsibility to give you the equipment you need to do your job effectively, comfortably, and safely. Equipment doesn’t just mean a computer. It also includes the peripherals, such as a monitor, mouse, and keyboard, plus the software you need to get your work done, and some of the furniture, too.

ou might request a new router if you need one, but check your contract first. It’s common for remote organizations to specify that internet connectivity is the responsibility of the employee, in which case a router would not be covered…though it never hurts to ask.

Depending on the nature of your work, you may need to ask for even more, such as a phone and dedicated phone number, webcam, microphone, headphones, lamp or ring light, notebooks, pens, a printer, and printer paper. What would you expect your employer to provide you if you were working on-site? You should get all the same supplies.

Furniture can be a tricky topic if your organization only went remote during the COVID-19 pandemic and thus doesn’t have a lot of formal policies in place for what is covered and not covered. A proper chair really should be covered for seated work, and maybe a desk too. If not, ask for a back cushion, foot rest, keyboard tray to attach to your existing desk or table, and any other add-ons that would make your setup more comfortable.

For software, beyond the apps you need for getting your day-to-day job done, your employer should provide you with a VPN for securely connecting to its remote servers, as well as keeping your connection secure more generally speaking when you’re away from home. Ideally, an organization should also roll out business-grade password managers, antivirus software, and adequate training and support for using them.

3. Expert Ergonomic Guidance

In all likelihood, you are not an expert in ergonomics.

The best remote organizations give employees access to advice and guidance for setting up an ergonomic home office. Ideally, it’s a session with an ergonomics professional who comes into your home or remote workspace and adjusts your setup with you. This person might make additional recommendations for equipment you need, and they should definitely advise you on your posture, frequency of taking breaks, and other points related to your health and safety while working.

If an in-person ergonomics fitting isn’t in the cards, then your employer should provide you with other resources that will help you do it yourself. Request a remote session with an expert or at the very least some documentation, such as a video made by an ergonomics professional that guides you to a safe and effective setup.

4. Training for Your Job and Your Career Development

Your employer should give you the appropriate training you need not only to do your job, but also for your career development. It’s true for both in-person work and remote work, but in remote work, where people literally see each other less often, training can be overlooked or forgotten about more easily.

When it comes to getting training, employees may need to advocate harder for themselves than they do for other resources. Your boss will make sure you have a laptop, but they might not ever think to offer you training. Be ready to ask for exactly what you want, list the cost, and make a case for why you need it.

Training can be formal, like your organization’s management track, or self-taught. What would help you do your job better or set you up for future success? What will help you develop your career? Do you need to learn Photoshop or get insight into people management? Would you benefit from a course on business writing or public speaking? You can find all kinds of training online, from live courses to recorded video lectures from online learning sites. Find what you want, decide when you will do the training (Go Start), and ask your employer to pay for it.

5. Technical, Logistical, and Social Support

If your work computer were to break, you’d expect your employer to fix it or replace it, right? With in-person work, your colleagues and boss will hear you complain about whatever’s broken, and in a large enough organization, it’s usually fairly easy to find someone who can solve your problem. In remote work, just figuring out who to ask for help can be hard. It really is your employer’s responsibility to make known the names of people you can ask for help (that is, not some generic email address).

Employees can feel pressured to limp along with broken equipment or even problematic policies. Resist. You cannot work if you don’t have the support you need.

Social support may sound unrelated but it’s really not. Being able to connect with coworkers matters to your success. We learn a lot just by talking with people, asking how work is going, getting insight into something as basic as the different benefits plans offered by an organization. That’s why employers need to give remote employees ways to connect. It might be the water-cooler Slack channel or a monthly virtual happy hour, a book club, in-person group volunteer opportunities, or something else. Whether or how much you choose to participate is up to you. But the option to do so needs to be readily available, created, and supported by your employer.

Demand What You Need

Certainly, employees have a role as individuals in making remote work successful. But we should never minimize what falls on the shoulders of the employer. If your organization doesn’t fulfill its end of the bargain, there’s no way your efforts can overcome that. 

I want remote employees to feel confident that they can make demands of their employers, politely yet firmly, and with the mindset that everyone has good intentions, even when they fall short. A lot of organizations got into remote work without knowing anything about it or how to do it right. Help them by telling them what you need from them to do your job well. If after some discussion your employer is unwilling to meet your needs, it may be time to consider other remote employment options.

source:https://www.pcmag.com/opinions/remote-work-employers-role