Working from home has always been seen as a great way to help improve the work/life balance of employees, but not all jobs – or all employees for that matter – are suitable for remote working.
So it’s interesting to see that Channel 4 is introducing agile working as part of its employment policy from January next year.
Channel 4 sales staff get work from home benefit
Channel 4 has been piloting an agile working policy across the all areas of its business since summer and it has now been officially introduced as policy. 4Sales , the broadcasters’ sales team, was the last department to benefit, due to the importance of getting the right technical support in place.
As we always say, if you offer staff the chance to work from home, you need to make sure they have the tech and support in place to allow them to do their job as well from home as they can from the office, and it seems Channel 4 think so too.
The broadcaster employs around 225 4Sales staff and has invested in laptop and mobile technology that can be used by staff when they work out of the office. The scheme is particularly pertinent to Channel 4 given the relocation of jobs from London to Leeds, Bristol, Glasgow and Manchester. While most jobs at 4Sales will remain in London, the traffic division, which co-ordinates the broadcast of ads, is moving to Leeds.
Channel 4 has confirmed the scheme has been introduced following feedback from sales staff who wanted to improve their work/life balance.
Things to consider when introducing agile working
The most important thing to consider when introducing agile working is to make sure employees have everything they need to be able to do their job effectively – if you’re thinking of letting staff work from home, check out Top 5 essential tech for telecommuters and Essential work from home apps.
You might also consider letting staff use their own devices for work, which can be a lot more convenient and save you money. But you need to approach any ‘bring-your-own’ (BYO) policy with caution as there are data security implications.
According to research from T-Systems, the corporate IT and cyber-security arm of Deutsche Telekom (Europe’s largest telecoms company), almost a third (31%) of employees use free WiFi at locations such as those at airports, hotels, coffee shops and bars, while just over a quarter (28%) email work documents to their private email on their own devices – and both can leave your company wide open to security breaches, and even cyber attacks.
For more on this risk, and how to mitigate it, check out Are telecommuters putting your business security at risk?
How ConferenceCall.co.uk can help agile working
Meetings are one of the biggest headaches faced by telecommuters – making the trip to the office for a single meeting isn’t the most productive use of time. That’s where ConferenceCall.co.uk can help.
To set up a conference call for up to 100 participants anywhere in the world, simply enter your email address at ConferenceCall.co.uk and we’ll send you your unique PIN number to get started.
It’s that simple.
