Why You Should Work from Home

Description

I am a diligent worker who follows through on my commitments. I’m quick to get started on tasks, usually avoid getting sidetracked and have a fairly optimistic outlook, although I can be plagued by self-doubt. An introvert, I prefer working alone and val- ue autonomy. At times I can be untrusting and skeptical of other people’s motives, and I have a tendency to become frustrated by and anxious about work-related dif culties. Sometimes I struggle to balance work and life. 

This is not a self-critique. It’s a summary of my Distributed Worker Personality Pro ler, a psycho- metric assessment created by Work EvOHlution, a company founded by an organizational psychologist whose goal is to use scienti c evidence to help peo- ple excel at exible work arrangements. Employees and managers use it to determine how naturally suited an individual is to working outside a traditional of ce. The Pro ler ags potential pitfalls and provides advice on how to circumvent them. For exam- ple, although I am very satis ed working from home as a freelance journalist, the assessment points out that some of my personality quirks may present a challenge. If an editor is stressing me out with what I perceive as unrealistic demands, my knee-jerk reaction to re off a frustrated e-mail could make the situation worse. Fortunately, as the assessment’s customized feedback advises, there are work-arounds. I can pause before responding, go burn off some steam at the gym, or write an angry draft e-mail and then delete it. 

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Some of that extra happiness may help keep homebound workers motivat- ed and on point, especially when the chips are down. In a 2016 Computers in Human Behavior study of 657 workers from a variety of industries, Nico W. Van Yperen, a psychologist at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, found that people who are high in their need for autonomy and who can blend on-site and off-site work do not lose their intrinsic motivation—that is, wanting to tackle a task because they nd the job itself rewarding—as work demands increase.

In contrast, colleagues who worked in the of ce reported a drop in motivation when work gets tough. “If you’re tired but you have to continue working because you’re in the of ce, you feel even more strained,” Van Yperen says. “But having the exibility to take a nap, go to the gym or play with your child—and then to continue working later—makes it easier for you to handle high demands because you can work when it’s most convenient for you.” 

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Van Yperen and his colleagues uncovered complementary results. In a 2014 study of 348 employees working across industries, they found that people with a high need for autonomy and a low need for structure and connection to others came out on top in a self-reported survey of how effective they thought they would be if given the opportunity for blended working.