Briefing: Productivity vs staff wellbeing – the homeworking conundrum

By Associate Editor Katie Scott

In March when the insurance industry collectively upped sticks to work from home, numerous challenges unfurled. Many of these were operational, for example getting call centres up and running or reimagining the loss adjusting process.

A consideration that has, perhaps, snowballed since the onset of prolonged, pandemic-induced home working has been the physical and mental wellbeing of the sector’s employees, which has bought topics like social isolation to the fore.

A dominant side effect of mass home working appears to be a boost in productivity – but how healthy is this really?

Time that was previously spent commuting is often now being spent working, with extra hours being tacked on to the beginning or end of an employee’s working day.

This is a trend that David Martin, Zurich Insurance UK’s head of retail, has noted.

He told me: “We are acutely aware some of the efficiency and productivity we’ve seen is because people are doing long hours on [Microsoft] Teams.

“On one hand, you could take a very operational view and say that productivity is improving, but at what cost?”

Richard Tuplin, managing director at Ethos Broking, agreed, calling the current lockdown home working model a “mental health timebomb”.

“We’re sat on a mental health timebomb; we need to do more as an employer to help our people through that,” he told me.

Furthermore, Brightside chief executive Brendan McCafferty told Insurance Times earlier this month that he is “seeing sickness levels fall off a cliff” – while this could be for any number of reasons, I hope it is not because employees feel unable to take a sick day just because they are working from home.

Having previously worked at an employee benefits trade magazine, extolling the virtues of employee wellbeing to me is very much preaching to the converted – although I confess I have also been guilty of extending my working day since eliminating the commute.

What I would say, however, is that considering and being proactive around employee wellbeing is not a new trend – or at least, it shouldn’t be.

The Covid-19 pandemic has merely acted as an amplifier; while navigating through the coronavirus fog, we’ve turned the headlights up to a full beam, so to speak.

With the world so focused on health and wellness as it fights Covid-19, it’s only natural that this mentality would infiltrate organisations’ people lens as well.

Maybe a lack of physical visibility has played its part too – instead of hiding behind desks, digital communications between staff members is booming and perhaps people are finding it easier to discuss their wellbeing needs, particularly around mental health, via a chat box or online message rather than in person, especially as everyone attempts to find their feet in this ‘new normal’ and clarify what works for them.

Although productivity gains on the face of it would appear to be positive, I would urge business leaders to ensure that this is not achieved at the sacrifice of employees’ personal wellbeing, as this is simply not sustainable.

Plus, what will happen when more people return to offices, potentially next year? Will this cause a productivity dip or motivate staff to knuckle down?

Granted, staff may be thriving due to the peace and quiet of their home office setups (myself included), but surely it’s better to be safe than sorry when good health is such a precious commodity right now.