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Remote and hybrid working has become the norm for many American workers to benefit their work/life balance. What isn’t as clear is the remote employees’ ability to access their fundamental workers’ rights, with the blurred lines between a physical and remote workplace creating conflicts, as handily summarized by the National Law Review.
In an environment where employers seek to gain the absolute most from their employees by enhancing restrictions and drawing back on their employee rights wherever possible, progressive employers can set themselves apart by looking at how they can go above and beyond to protect staff.
Providing workers compensation
Workers comp is a familiar topic for any business. As Business News Daily rightly outlines, businesses of all sizes need to provide workers comp from their inception – and that’s no different for small and medium enterprises that hire remote employees. Arguments have started to arise over the level of coverage that worker’s compensation provides and what injuries businesses will consider themselves liable for.
The remote working environment, outside of the classic environment that businesses provide, offers that distinction. Of course, workers are eligible for workers comp where injuries occur in the workplace. Remote working firms can go above and beyond by looking at the impact of their work on their employees in their own homes and offering comp to bridge that gap; for example, where repetitive strain injuries crop up from the nature of their computer use.
Ensuring fair pay for remote employees
One potential downside to remote working, at least for employees, is longer hours. The blur between work and leisure time, and the lack of a commute, means that many workers are predisposed to hour creep, providing extra hours off the clock.
According to Money.com, the average working week is longer as a result. Taking a proactive approach to this, either by implementing a flexible working time system where employees can accrue hours in excess of their contract or through offering overtime, is one option to recognize this. Another is to be more strict with working hours but ensure that workloads are amended to reflect that. Either will also help to head off stress at the pass – doing right by your employees once again.
Careful on hybrid
Many larger employers are finding that they require some in-office attendance for their businesses to succeed, according to USA Today. Hybrid working can be an effective driver of change – it allows greater engagement with employees. However, remote working is valuable to workers – especially those living with disability, whether mobility related or not. As such, it’s crucial to make a fair offer to employees and work with them to organize the best days to meet in-office – rather than going for a one-size-fits-all approach.
Taking a caring and compassionate attitude towards remote workers will help you to get the most out of them. Rather than feeling like their quality of life is under threat, they will be encouraged and comfortable instead. With that comes the best quality of work and best engagement.
