Crafting a Work from Home Policy that Helps Your Company Thrive
We’ve seen an increase in the prevalence of remote work in the last few years. In fact, WeConsult is a completely remote team who works remotely with our clients! There are many benefits of remote work for the employee and the company (cost savings, stress reduction, and addressing the gender gap, to name a few). But these benefits aren’t exclusive to remote teams. Even if your organization is predominantly on-site, you can dip your toe in by embracing a work from home policy.
Why we love a WFH policy
Giving employees the flexibility to work from home helps them feel trusted and can promote greater productivity. For any introverted workers out there, we know how much you can get done when you have that heads down focus time!
As a small business owner myself, I understand that it can be nerve-wracking to start letting folks work from home. Some employers fear they’ll get diminished results from their team or not be able to rally them together for important events, like a client site launch. The best way to roll out a work from home policy is to do the legwork first, introduce the policy with clear expectations, and follow through on the plan. For each step of this process, we’ve laid out a few tips to get started.
Starting from scratch: how to draft your policy
Identify how flexible you want to go. This can range from come-and-go as you please, to dedicated days where everyone works from home, to working from home only when it’s absolutely necessary (i.e. repair happening at home). Check in with your team; discuss how the current project load might be affected. Ask if there are any potential challenges they see regarding resource planning. An open invitation to the process will ensure a policy that the team will support.
Brainstorm expectations. It’s helpful to think of expectations in a few categories: resources and behavior. Basic resource expectations should include a laptop and strong wifi connection. Behavior expectations should outline things like checking in on Slack or email occasionally, in case their teams need them. Clarifying these expectations up front will help minimize misunderstanding.
Gather necessary equipment and accounts. We recommend you get the equipment you need to make it seamless to continue working. Some things that help: Zoom account, proper microphone setup, and accessible webcams in the conference rooms. You might already have many of these tools! There are new apps created each year that help distributed teams collaborate better. Try them out and see what works best for you!
Announcing the Policy: the Rollout
Introduce the work from home policy. Start with the purpose of the policy. Highlight the ways it addresses feedback you’ve received from them and how it will add value to your company. Point out where the written policy is located in your shared docs or wiki so that employees can reference it.
Clarify the process for scheduling. Make sure your team communicates when they’ll be working from home. This communication should correspond to the type of policy you introduced. For example, if you allow employees to choose one day a week to work from home, you should ask that WFH days be listed in a team calendar. If you have a come-and-go policy with no requirement to schedule ahead, then you might encourage the team to indicate on their Slack profile when they’ll be working from home. Regardless of how loose or strict your policy is, clear expectations around communication will help prevent misunderstanding and disappointment.
Reinforce a culture that values time together. With the newfound freedoms comes a responsibility for agency owners to ensure the moments on-site are worthwhile. This reinforces respect for everyone’s time. If everyone is in the office on Mondays, use that time to host clients or do sprint planning together. It can be helpful to articulate your preferences as well, letting the team know you prefer that they come in as often as possible. Let them know you enjoy time together in-person. That way your team will use WFH only when needed and know that you trust them to make that decision.
With the current trajectory of employment patterns, a work from home policy can be the competitive edge you need! Start slowly and craft a policy that will work for you. Introduce it to your team and watch as productivity rises.
