Crucial Benefits and Challenges of Recruiting Remote Workers

The pandemic made more and more business organizations switch from conventional in-house workplaces to remote work.

A recent study on the statistics of remote employees has revealed that the number of remote workers has increased 173% since 2005. According to the opinion of the experts, the number of remote workers will accelerate in 2021.

You can say, 56% of the workforce across the globe could work from home in 2022.

Amazingly, your remote workers can do the same amount of tasks as they could do as in-office employees with just a few things like a steady internet connection, a laptop, and a Smartphone. Isn’t it?

It is proved that remote workers or virtual employees do their job more productively than in-office workers. Besides that, there are many good reasons why a majority of the businesses are recruiting staff outside their headquarters, in a foreign country with a different time zone.

So, there is no wonder that every business leader is focusing on hiring remote workers at present. Now, what are the advantages they are getting while hiring remote workers? What are the disadvantages that come as on the opposite side of the coin?

We’ll figure out all the answers in this piece of article. Let’s start!

What is remote work?

It is a practice of employees accomplishing their tasks from their preferred location instead of working from the employers’ office.

The work location can be the employee’s home, a co-working space, a coffee shop, or another place outside the central office building and campus.

What should you look for in a remote worker?

You already know that hiring remote employees can reduce the expense, set you free from managing your in-office resources, increase productivity, and a lot more.

However, you will avail all those benefits when you choose a suitable remote employee. There is a mandatory skill-set that you must look for in your minor candidates.

Here is the list of the qualities that should be there in your remote employees. Have a look!

1. Excellent communication skills so that your team never faces issues collaborating. Good communication can boost collaboration and lead to more immeasurable project meetups. It utilizes in almost every industry.
2. They should focus on the outcome instead of activities.
3. Ability to plan and take decisions independently when required. This essential life skill should be taught from the beginning since decision-making takes years of preparation to master. A remote worker must know how to take decisions independently.
4. They must have a positive attitude. A positive attitude helps you accomplish more easily the daily affairs of life.
5. A strong sense of accountability is mandatory.
6. A remote employee should always stay self-motivated.
7. As your team is not working from the same place, every team staff should be quickly responsive. Otherwise, they will delay the business operations.

What are the advantages of recruiting remote employees?

A remote workforce has advantages, including access to a broader talent pool and excluding expenses incurred from managing a local office. Recently Stanford University has stated that the advantages of working from home include increased productivity, job satisfaction, and a developed sense of autonomy.

Let me give you five more advantages when you hire resources who will work from home for you.

• It reduces the overhead expense
• Increased productivity
• Access to a large talent pool
• Your employees can save more
• Time-saving

Let’s elaborate on the benefits now.

It reduces the overhead expense.

Rent, utilities, parking fees, safety systems, and secondary maintenance projects are unnecessary when every team member works remotely.

When your employees work remotely, they don’t need to come to the office. It saves the rent of office building.

Besides, you can save the overhead cost of each employee such as furniture, beverage and snacks, electricity, cleaners, office supplies, and insurance, etc.

Glassdoor has shown that the companies are getting near a 30% increase in profit after hiring remote employees.

Increased productivity

In an Owl Labs study, full-time remote workers said they’re happy in their job 22% more than people never operating remotely. Additionally, according to another study, 97% of full-time remote employees support remote work to others.

It is now clearly shown that remote workers are more productive. They can pay complete attention to fulfilling their responsibilities as their colleagues don’t sidetrack them.

Remote employees work happily as they can work from any location and inflexible schedule.

The best thing is, remote workers usually take fewer sick leaves. And, there is no chance of being absent because of transport or weather issues.

Access to a large talent pool

Offshore outsourcing providers like Invedus-Virtual Employees Outsourcing widen talent pool options even more. They can arrange workforce resources from countries with lower salary expectations without significantly sacrificing worker competency. Countries like India have surprisingly high English literacy rates. Communication barriers will hardly become a problem for any business owner. 

Remote hiring opens the door for you to recruit more efficient employees from all over the world.

You have to limit yourself in hiring residents to build your In-office workforce. That’s how you can lose the opportunity to hire talented workers from anywhere.

Your employees can save more

“Global Workplace Analytics also estimated that having an employee working half their hours remotely could save businesses as much as $11,000 per employee per year on costs including things such as parking, office space, and fleet management” – abc11

An in-office employee has to spend money on transport, lunch, and beverages. If they work from home, they can save the money that they had to pay for travel.

Overall, they can save on food expenses, car insurance, gas, and maintenance.

Time-saving

Long commutes to work and from work waste a lot of time and make the employees exhausted. When people did manage to gain free time, it often wasn’t spent wisely. Without an office to commute to, the separation between work and home becomes tenuous. They can’t spend quality time with their family.

Also, people on remote teams tend to be happier because of their freedom and flexibility.

That’s why many employees relocate themselves nearby their office location. And. It costs them a lot of money. There are many other benefits of hiring a virtual employee that are not on this list.

What are the disadvantages of recruiting remote employees?

I know you are overwhelmed by seeing the benefits of hiring remote workers. Now let me tell you the challenges you have to defeat to build an efficient and productive team of remote workers. Check it out!

• Lack of communication among the team members
• More distractions
• Different time zone

Now we will explain those demerits in brief.

Lack of communication among the team members

Remote working doesn’t let you establish an organizational culture, camaraderie, and the feeling of togetherness among your remote employees.

In a nutshell, you might face a problem building a solid team spirit.

More distractions

If your employees work from home, they may be distracted by the events that are going on in their homes.

Relatives and neighbors can try to involve them in various engagements. Along with that, as they are working in the comfort of home, they might feel way too relaxed and start compromising with the commitment to their work.

People who are working remotely suggest breaking up your work and post your schedule so that all the tasks you are doing can be completed without any distractions. They can also do one best thing, create a set office. That will bring peace and help your mind to stay focus on your work.

Different time zone

Working with clients in different time zones is challenging. Unless you have expertise in national and global business, thinking about time zones, cultures, and non-standard business hours will need time to deal with and get used to.

It would help if you had to deal with different time zones as your employees will be working from different corners of the globe. Dealing with that can be challenging from time to time.

Now there are many virtual employees who are working comfortably with the time zone that you decide for them. The best thing they practice is the world clock on mobile and time zone talk.

Author’s opinion

We have already seen how beneficial remote working can be for your organization if you implement it correctly. The demerits are very nominal, and you can win over them.

Let me explain to you how!

Arrange a team call regularly so that your team stays high on vibes and your employees don’t feel alone. It will help your section to create a solid understanding among each other.

Make the schedule for the employees working from different time zones a bit flexible so that your team members get a few standard hours to work with each other.

You can ask your virtual employees to install a tracker on their system to help you monitor their work progress. By this, you can track all the important details related to your business productivity and work.

With all these details I hope you got all the answers to your questions related to remote workers.