5 Remote Work Trends to Look Out for in 2021

2020 was a game-changing year that made businesses around the world switch to a remote work setup. As the situation around the world changed, we learned to adjust and adapt. But what will 2021 bring us in terms of the work from home situation? How could anyone keep pace with the trend? To help your business thrive in remote work setup this 2021, let’s go through some remote work trends that you should watch out for this year.

5 Remote Work Trends in 2021

According to studies, 48% of employees today join video calls with a more comfortable outfit and 84% of people enjoy working from home. These figures only show that after more than a year of remote work, it seems that we have become used to the home office.

With months of opportunity to learn how to cope with today’s work setup, are you now ready for the future of remote work? Let’s take a look at the remote work trends to look out for in 2021.

1. Companies Staying Remote or Switching to a Flexible Work Style

Many businesses that allowed their employees a remote work setup since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic are looking at the possibility to either implement a permanent work from home setup or a hybrid/flexible situation for some even after the pandemic. Few companies have also mentioned that they will surely permanently switch to the new work setup. 

This is aligned with the initial thoughts of many industry leaders. They have seen the rise of remote workers starting 2021 as companies are now more willing to adapt to changes. 

Since the majority of businesses didn’t have much choice but to allow employees to work remotely when the pandemic started, they have tried the trial and error stage. And what’s great about it is that it became a way for them to see the issues that may arise in a remote working environment, such as cyber threats and collaboration issues, and have already found ways to deal with them. They are now more willing to shift as they have seen that it is actually possible with the right tools and strategies, especially that a remote team has many benefits aside from being cost-effective. 

2. Collaborative Work Will be the Key

Managing collaborative work is undoubtedly more challenging in remote work than in an office. However, you can’t just let your people feel alone or do totally individual work, especially that a survey showed that 77% of employees perform better when there is collaborative work. Employees are more productive when they know they are working with others as there is the spirit of teamwork. 

To properly achieve collaborative work, you need to manage the responsibilities and the flow of the team. You can conduct team meetings and engagement activities to make the team feel closer to each other. This also helps reduce the awkwardness and increase comfortability with the team members.

Here are some collaborative tools you can use to encourage efficiency and productivity:

• Slack
• Trello
• Google Drive
• Zoom
• Monday.com, and many more

Related Article: How to Improve Remote Team Collaboration and Workflow

3. Switching to Remote-friendly Company Benefits and Perks

Most of the already set benefits and perks of companies are great when working in the office. But since we’ve switched to a remote work setup, organizations will also reevaluate their original plan and make it “remote-friendly”. 

Here are a few examples you can do to make your company benefits and perks better in a remote work situation:

• The budget you’re saving for team lunch can be divided among your employees as an additional allowance. If you want the team to still have moments to eat together, you can do home deliveries.
• The rewards and prizes from your virtual team activities can be online gift certificates or vouchers instead of a material thing.
• The gym memberships perk can be shifted to an online workout or training subscription so you’re people don’t have to go out. 

You might also find it interesting to keep your staff comfortable working from home by providing them with better quality equipment they need or even a work chair that is great to avoid back pains. They will surely appreciate it.

4. The Emergence of Cloud-based Tools for Remote Operations

The increase in remote workers also means the rise of cloud-based tools. Aside from the transition to work from home setup, the pandemic has pushed companies to shift to digital documents, online tools, and automation for remote operations. And this year, experts are expecting it to be more popular than ever. 

Some tasks and operations that companies find difficult to do remotely during the start of a pandemic were hiring, onboarding, hr tasks, and payroll. But today, companies can finally deal with these well with all the remote access tools introduced, including the following:

• Oracle
• IntegraHris 365
• Google Meet
• Zoom
• RemoteTeam
• Hubstaff; and many more

The emergence of all-in-one platforms will also be one of the forefronts of remote work trends. Tools like these will help employees get a better workflow, be more productive, and save time. They don’t need to visit one site to another when doing tasks. A great example of this is Monday.com that allows you to sync apps in their workspace. 

5. Enhanced cybersecurity strategies

With continuous technological innovation, cyber insider threats are growing and remote work setup may open even more opportunities for cyberattacks. A recent study found out that 20% of organizations experience security breaches because of remote workers. This is exactly why one of the top remote work trends in 2021 is enhanced cybersecurity strategies. 

Since a huge percentage of employees around the world will stay in a work-from-home situation this 2021 because of the pandemic, businesses will improve their cybersecurity strategies. You should take extra precautions to ensure the security of all the important information you have as nowadays, data is the new gold. 

In Conclusion

It was estimated that by the end of 2021, 25-30% of the workforce will be permanently working from home. With this figure, we can truly see that remote work is here to stay and will continue to grow in the years to come. Therefore, if you are a business owner or a decision-maker, fine-tuning your business processes and strategies with these remote work trends may help you stay in the game. 

Build Your Remote Work Team in the Philippines

Building your own team of remote work professionals is now easier and more efficient with Booth & Partners’ outsourcing services in the Philippines. When you outsource, you don’t have to worry about the cybersecurity strategies, the cloud-based tools to use, and overall changes in the way we do business today. We will take care of those things for you. Our cost-effective staffing solutions have been helping many businesses of all sizes around the world for years. Get in touch with us today to learn more about our services.