January 2025 — Three Canadian unions with more than 330,000 workers launched a campaign for remote work. The unions got together to require the federal government to have flexible work arrangements.
Sharon DeSousa, the national president of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) said, “The evidence is clear: remote work is good work.”
The Backstory
The world has undergone significant change in the aftermath of the global pandemic.
Before the widespread invasion of COVID-19, the concept of working from home was not even thinkable to many people.
It seemed to be a given that the best way to work was to be at the physical business of the company one was employed in.
About 7% of Canadians worked remotely in May 2016, according to Statistics Canada, compared to 40% in April 2020, and 20% in November 2023.
The concept of telecommuting was first suggested in the 1970s by rocket scientist Jack Nilles but the available technology at the time could not facilitate its widespread adoption.
In 2020, with the advancement in technology, including the Internet, email, Software-as-a-Service (Saas), and personal computers, those technological limitations were no longer an issue.
It was the pandemic that finally pushed the telecommuting model into a feasible and popular one.
As more and more people were diagnosed with COVID-19, it became a concern to keep people from being in close quarters. Before long, companies had to find a way to continue operations with people’s bodies being missing from the office.
In comes the work-at-home initiative to maintain productivity. Those who had the coronavirus and were still capable of working could do so from the safety of their homes.
Employers could still run their operations and employees could reduce their exposure to traffic congestion—a win-win, if you will.
While lockdowns lasted, many employers had to send a large number of their employees to work from home. But when the vaccine did its magic and people started to feel normal again, the employers’ demand to go back to the office cubicles followed suit.
The Pushback
The take-up rate of remote work is different according to the industry, area, and level of employment.
Some sectors including technology, financial services, business and professional, creative, media and entertainment have easily integrated remote work into their business models while others such as healthcare and manufacturing have stuck to the conventional method of work.
When the first return-to-office plans started to emerge in 2021, it was the employees who were able to work from home who complained. They did not want to lose the flexibility that remote work provided.
Employees valued remote work so much that some of them were willing to leave their jobs if they were to be asked to work from the office full-time.
However, several big companies issued policies that stated that their employees had to go back to the office. Some of those companies include Google, Amazon, JPMorgan, and Zoom. The federal government workers were also expected to be in the office three days a week.
The statements made by the senior executives of various companies during the pandemic that remote work was effective and could be made permanent were no longer applicable. This time the issue was not only the necessity of face-to-face communication but also the fear of reduced productivity.
To the companies, it became more effective to work from the office. It also became more cost-effective to downsize the workforce although many companies had grown financially during the pandemic.
The industries that have embraced remote work, for example, tech industries, have had increasing layoffs. In 2023, in an open letter to his employees, the CEO of Meta, Mark Zuckerberg announced, “Our initial analysis of the performance data suggests that engineers who either joined Meta on-site and then moved to remote or who joined remote performed, on average, worse than those who joined in-person.”
In the same letter, he announced the layoff of about 10,000 people. As a result of increasing layoffs, many employees have had to comply with their return-to-office policies.
The Compromise
The concept of the hybrid work model appeared after the pandemic as a middle ground between the approaches of companies and employees.
Working remotely has many benefits for both the employees and the organizations. The employees get flexibility, better work-life balance, and low costs associated with travel and child care.
As for the employers, they are able to hire from a larger talent pool, have lower costs, and often, higher productivity from a happy remote team. This way, the environment also benefits from reduced pollution and a smaller carbon footprint.
According to a Statistics Canada study, if all the eligible remote workers in 2015 had worked from home, transportation emissions could have been reduced by 9.5 megatonnes or 12 percent of the household transportation emissions that year.
Some issues are there and the primary concern is that of isolation of employees as certain workers face problems with less social interaction and teamwork. Furthermore, issues regarding career growth also come into the picture since remote employees may have limited opportunities for networking and visibility within the company.
Therefore, to make remote work sustainable, businesses must tackle these issues by improving communication, providing mental health services, and spending on digital tools. Hence, it can be predicted that the trend of remote work will increase further in the future.
It is anticipated that most organizations will adopt a hybrid model, which will combine the advantages of remote work and in-person work. Organizations that adapt to this change and devote themselves to their remote employees will be well-equipped for the future in a world that is increasingly connected.
The Canadian federal unions have backed remote work, hence flexible work arrangements are still under consideration as the pushback persists. The unions said, “We are also calling on the public to join the movement and support remote work — not only for the federal public service, but as a new standard for workplaces across the country.”
Conclusion
Remote work is here to stay. There are challenges, but the flexibility, more job opportunities, and technological development are worth it.
By solving the problem of the absence of connectivity, by improving the remote work policies, and by creating a solid digital workplace culture, companies can succeed in the future of work.
PSAC’s research shows that remote options and flexible work arrangements are critical for attracting and keeping the right employees.
As individuals, businesses, and policymakers continue to adapt, one thing is clear—remote work is not just a trend but a fundamental shift in how we work and live.✿