As the ability to work from home continues to rise and becomes more acceptable to employers, the more appealing “remote working” and “working from home” becomes. When you think about working from home, you might initially think of the flexible work hours.
You may also see the appeal of creating your work schedule and not having to commute to the office. Often, it is easy to look at the advantages of working from home that it is easy to overlook the disadvantages. If you do not do your homework ahead of time, you might find that working from home is not all that it is cracked up to be.
Before you decide to trade in an office workspace for a virtual office, it is essential that you learn all that you can about the remote work environment. To better determine if working from home is right for you, check out the below ten disadvantages to working from home.
Lack of Self-Discipline and Motivation
When you work in a physical work environment, you encounter bosses and managers who can motivate you to finish your work. When you work from home, your bosses and managers stay behind at the office. Therefore, to complete your assignments, only you can motivate yourself to do so. If you choose to work from home, you must have the self-discipline and the motivation not to let everyday distractions prevent you from checking the items off of your to-do list.
Lack of Social Interactions
For many workers, the highlight of their work day is the daily trips to the water cooler to catch up on the latest office gossip. If you are an introvert and tend to shy away from socializing with coworkers, then working from home may be ideal for you. If you are an extrovert who works better in an environment surrounded by coworkers, bosses, and managers, then you may feel isolated working from home. If you enjoy collaborating on projects with others and going out to lunch with colleagues, then you may not benefit from working from home as you might start to feel isolated.
Exposure to Distractions
When you work in an office setting, you must stay on your best behavior or fear of getting in trouble from managers and bosses. When you work from home, no one is looking over your shoulder when you start looking up cat videos on the internet as you push your assignments to the far corner of your desk. If you do not trust yourself to finish your work without the proper supervision, then working from home may be a severe distraction to your work.
Miscommunication with Coworkers
When none of your communication happens face-to-face, it can be easy for messages to get mixed. Typically, remote workers communicate via an online messaging system or through email, in which certain instructions or requests may not be communicated as clearly or in-depth. This can lead to problems with getting the work done. Therefore, remote workers may have to turn to phone calls and video calls more than they anticipated just to understand what’s going on.
Lack of Job Growth
Working from home is the equivalent of the expression “out of sight out of mind.” Meaning, that if your bosses do not see how you work day-to-day, they may forget to consider you for promotions or pay raises. If you do not make regularly scheduled trips to your office to visit with co-workers and supervisors, it may be easy for them to overlook you as a serious candidate for growth within the company.
Lack of Technology
When you work from home, you may not have access to all the necessary office equipment to do your job effectively, such as laser printers, high-speed copiers, and secure internet connections. Depending on the job that you do remotely, it may be extremely costly to replicate a home office. Meaning, you may be spending more money upgrading your computer system than the job is worth. If you work for a company that has most of its documents in paper-only format, it may be more beneficial to work in-house where you will have quick access to the material that you need.
Household Noises
While it is common for workplaces to be loud, you can expect to find the usual office noises, such as coworkers talking loudly to clients on the phone and interns sucking up to the boss. When you work from home, you are introduced to an array of distractions in the form of household noises.
You may be distracted halfway through an assignment by the dryer buzzing to let you know that the clothes you threw in last night are still waiting to be folded. If you share a home with people who are also home when you are working, you can become distracted by the noises that they make. If you are easily distracted, you may want to keep your home life and your work life separate.
Difficulties in Distinguishing Work Life and Home Life
When you work from home, it is hard to separate your work life from your home life. You may see chores around the house that need to be completed, or you may be compelled to spend time with a roommate or family members. If you do not think you will be able to work from home without alphabetizing your books or playing video games with your roommate when you should be working, then you may want to stick to a traditional office environment.
Working Round the Clock is Common
You may think that when you work from home that you will be able to get your work done in less amount of time than in an office setting and that you will have more free time. What most people don’t realize is that it is harder for people who work from home to “shut off” at the end of the day. When you work in an office, it is easy to put the workday behind you when you pull out of the parking lot. When you work from home, you may be compelled to respond to that email that you got at eight o’clock at night as you were drawing a warm bath. Therefore, if you do not want your work life and your personal life to blur together, then working from home may not be ideal for you.
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