Experts break down what remote work will look like going forward, offer tips to home-based job seekers
NEW YORK -- As our response to COVID continues to evolve, so does our approach to work, and how and where we do it.
CBS2's Natalie Duddridge has a look at working remotely, if it's really here to stay, and how to make it work for you.
Katie Schenk, who works in brand marketing, is enjoying the perks of working from home.
"I don't have to get up early to drive an hour into the office. I get to take my dog on a longer walk in the morning," Schenk said.
She said her previous job was going back to a hybrid in-office schedule, so she quit to work for a company where she could remain 100 percent remote.
"I really love working remote. I'm more productive. And it just felt a little bit like we weren't being appreciated by being mandated to come back 50 percent of the time despite the significant increase in productivity and our success being in a remote environment," Schenk said.
The "great resignation" has helped shift employees mindsets about how they approach working today.
"I didn't want to work from home, and I still haven't worked from home," said Lew Weiss, president of All Metals & Forge.
So that means an eerily quiet office for Weiss. He and his assistant are the lone inhabitants in their New Jersey office.
His nearly 20 employees have lobbied to stay remote. Weiss said the upside is that he's been able to reduce his office footprint, saving money to keep everyone employed, plus, "We're getting more production and we're getting more hours, actually."
Still, business expert Carl Gould said what's working for Schenk and Weiss may not be best for business in the long term.
"Nobody before COVID was saying, well, let's send all of our employees home. That's going to help our morale and culture," Gould said.
But a January survey by the Partnership For New York City shows Only 16 percent of employers say that average daily attendance at their Manhattan offices currently exceeds 50 percent.
And while some companies are offering perks like catered meals and even cash bonuses to get workers back in-house, Gould says that kind of corporate policy is not sustainable over the long term.
"They can't just all of a sudden open up the vault and just throw buckets of cash at you," Gould said.
He added there may be some other doable steps to entice employees back.
"One of our clients hired a cleaning service to go to everybody's house and they'll clean their house, do their laundry, and do their dishes," Gould said.
In terms of finding remote work, Insider Leadership editor Brandon T. Harden says to remember that you're now competing against a national, even global, workforce.
"I would remove the location from the resume completely. I would just have a phone number and an email and let the company ask you where are you based," Harden said.
And he offered this: Employee beware.
"Some companies want to pay people less for remote work, unfortunately. I would say do your homework on the company's policies beforehand, before you go into the interviews, before you even apply," Harden said.
He added whether you're hybrid or remote, this is also the time to consider more than the where-you-work-from aspect of the business.
"Instead of asking about a specific perk, maybe ask about their diversity strategy, maybe ask about their sustainability strategy, maybe get into the core of what this business believes," Harden said.
