{"id":31875,"date":"2019-02-20T15:03:39","date_gmt":"2019-02-20T20:03:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/?p=31875"},"modified":"2019-12-19T10:57:48","modified_gmt":"2019-12-19T15:57:48","slug":"telecommuting-positively-impacts-job-performance-fiu-business-study-reveals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/2019\/02\/telecommuting-positively-impacts-job-performance-fiu-business-study-reveals\/","title":{"rendered":"Telecommuting positively impacts job performance, FIU Business study reveals."},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Telecommuting<\/p>\n

Telecommuting contributes to improved job performance for employees in complex jobs, allowing them to benefit from fewer interruptions common in an office setting, research from FIU Business finds.<\/p>\n

Overall, telecommuting has little negative impact on performance, even in jobs that require frequent interaction and communication with others.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe find that for most job characteristics we examine in our study, telecommuting doesn\u2019t significantly hurt job performance,\u201d said Ravi Gajendran, assistant professor in the Department of Global Leadership and Management<\/a>, who conducted the research. \u201cFor some job features, performance is better with more extensive telecommuting and in others, the impact is neutral.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Ravi
Ravi Gajendran<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The findings, published in the February 2019 issue of the Journal of Business and Psychology<\/em>, examined job complexity and problem solving as well as interdependence and social support, to determine the telecommuting\u2013job performance relationship.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople often think of telecommuting in terms of its implications for work-family balance. But focusing on its flexibility benefits alone does not provide a complete picture of telecommuting\u2019s potential upsides for employees and organizations,\u201d Gajendran said. \u201cYou can think of telecommuting as a way for enhancing employee performance in jobs with certain features.\u201d<\/p>\n

The study tested data from a random sample of 273 telecommuters and their supervisors at an organization with a voluntary telecommuting program. Among the jobs held by these employees – marketing (13 percent), programming (24 percent), accounting (10 percent), engineering (23 percent), finance (6 percent), and sales (15 percent). On average, respondents telecommuted roughly 2 days per week.<\/p>\n

One surprising result: telecommuting improved job performance when social support from co-workers or managers is low, suggesting perhaps that distance buffers employees from the downsides of unsupportive relationships at work.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you don\u2019t have a supportive environment, maybe you\u2019re better off being away from it,\u201d said Gajendran. \u201cThat may help with performance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Telecommuting has been on the rise since 2005, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and the U.S. Census. The BLS\u2019 2017 American Time Use Survey indicated that 23 percent of U.S. employees did some or all of their work at home.<\/p>\n

Gajendran and co-author Timothy Golden, professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute\u2019s Lally School of Management, agree more is needed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe haven\u2019t done a good job of understanding how electronic communication can substitute face-to-face interaction; the thought is that when you\u2019re away from the office something suffers,\u201d said Gajendran. \u201cAlso, there may be a generation of people just as comfortable, if not more, working via electronic technology as face-to-face.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Telecommuting contributes to improved job performance for employees in complex jobs, allowing them to benefit from fewer interruptions common in an office setting, research from FIU Business finds. Overall, telecommuting has little negative impact on performance, even in jobs that require frequent interaction and communication with others. \u201cWe find that for most job characteristics we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":31885,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[4,10],"tags":[4387,4519,4483,2229,4481],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31875"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31875"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32029,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31875\/revisions\/32029"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}