Mass Stay Away From The Office on 15th May

In what could be the largest mass absence from work for a generation, an estimated five million people will not be going to work on Thursday, 15th May. None of them will be calling sickies, skiving or making excuses. In fact, their bosses may even be joining them and taking work home for the day, on National Work from Home Day.

National Work from Home Day is aimed at highlighting smarter working practices by encouraging companies to give employees a day at home. Working at home that is, in order to trial better working practises such as flexible working, remote working, mobile working and working from home; all promoting a work-life balance.

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The traditional 'office' is heading for a workplace revolution. Century-old established, outdated working cultures and traditions need to break down. They are wasteful in terms of resources and time, damaging in terms of the environment and global warming, unhealthy in terms of worker wellbeing, and frustrating in terms of traffic congestion and public transport overcrowding.

Adopting a modern day approach to our working lives will increase business productivity and competitiveness, reduce transport congestion and pollution, improve health by reducing stress, assist disadvantaged groups and harmonise our work and family commitments. Of course, remote working also gives employers the added advantage of recruiting talented individuals from anywhere in the country instead of just around their local office.

Research shows that the structure of the labour market is going to be reshaped dramatically over the four years, with remote working expected to almost double. There are already around 3.1 million people working from home in the UK and this is expected to double by 2012! The recent emergence of 'virtual jobs' and 'virtual communities' is changing the way companies attract and retain skilled employees.

Remote Employment, a web service dedicated to flexible and home based recruitment, invites companies across the UK to support National Work from Home, by giving their employees the ability to work flexible hours or work from home. Founder and Managing Director, Ken Sheridan believes a flexible employment solution benefits business, employees, and the country as a whole.

Sheridan advocates that the notion of nine to five might gradually vanish, with staff working ad-hoc hours around their home commitments. Offices will probably disappear and instead mini business centres could spring up near satellite offices. Increasingly people will work from home as organisations cut down their overheads on office space and use remote locations as the new-age workplace.

Sheridan said: ìThe recent emergence of 'virtual jobs' and ëvirtual communitiesí is changing the way companies attract and retain skilled employees. Smarter organisations reduce employment costs by adopting ëremote workingí as a regular employment solution. With this new approach, many employers are now considering remote working and working from home as viable options in their recruitment drive.î

The South East has the highest proportion of commuters with the average person spending the equivalent of an additional working day each week commuting. It also boasts the biggest proportion of home workers: over 600,000 people work from home (excluding London), which is nearly 15 per cent of the working population. This has increased by nearly a quarter in the last decade.

A true success story is BT, one of the South Eastís largest private sector employers. Mike Galvin, South East Regional Director for BT, evangelises flexible working as a vital part of remaining competitive in this rapidly-changing internet age. He believes it is one of the key tools to reduce cost structure and offers a vibrant, compelling approach to employment solutions.

Galvin said: ìAs a leader of flexible working in the UK, BT is seeing huge benefits both for the company and its people. It has been absolutely beneficial to increasing productivity and reduced our need for office space, resulting in annual savings of 88 million on overheads, reducing our need for office space. For example we had 23 offices in London and now have only five. We have 70, 000 flexible workers of which 11.5% are home based.

ìWe would certainly encourage employers across the UK to take full advantage of smarter working. With the cost of transport continuing to rise there couldnít be a better time for people and organisations to ask themselves whether they could work more flexibly.î

Remote Employment hopes thousands of companies and organisations will join the workplace revolution by implementing flexible working practices to the benefit of their business, their employees, and the country as a whole. For more information, see www.remoteemployment.com or www.workwiseuk.org.