No commute, more family time, better work-life balance, more savings, and more opportunities are some of the obvious reasons to work from home. When it comes to more specific circumstances or individuals with certain needs, working from home isn’t a privilege but the only way to earn a living. In this article, we will discover and uncover the reasons to work from home that people don’t really talk about.
Check out this article to know all the details about remote work.
Medical Reasons to Work From Home
1. Physical Health
We can imagine having a pizza slice in one hand and a mouse in the other while we sink ourselves in the fluffy upholstery of our go-to couch at home (We mean a desktop/laptop mouse; don’t get ideas). That scene is possible in two instances:
- Netflix and chill
- Remote work
This is the comfort that working from home brings for everyone, including those who have certain health-related challenges.
Now, forget about working from home for a second. Have you ever thought about what work in an office looks like for those who are differently-abled?
For starters, I live with an autoimmune disorder (Hidredenitis Suppurativa if you’re curious) and I have been in physical pain 24X7 for 17 years with a lifetime to go. Remote work came to me as a huge blessing last year. Before that, it was every day of commuting to and from work for 12 long years. I never complained, not because I wanted to stay hush hush about my condition but because I had no choice. Now I do and I’ve never been healthier physically, mentally, and emotionally.
This is just me, but there are so many others like me who could be suffering from many other health conditions that render them motionless or pained or helpless in some way. Many people are capable and efficient, but their physical disabilities or other health conditions limit them from taking bigger steps in their career. Remote work has changed that by offering global opportunities with companies that are more inclusive.
Check this article here to discover more strategies to improve your psychological safety as a remote worker.
This is one of the unspoken reasons to work from home. Not everyone openly admits to working from home because of a medical condition. That doesn’t matter as long as remote work finally brings them some relief and hope that to achieve something in life, they don’t need to step out of their homes and risk their overall health.
Other physical health benefits of remote work:
- Eat healthy home-cooked meals (with “once in a while” pizza days).
- When you work from home, you stay away from all kinds of pollution that could harm your skin, eyes, or lungs.
- You save yourself from back problems because you can take breaks more frequently and sit on comfortable chairs that you choose for yourself. In an office, you don’t have a choice, and with limited breaks, you sit on your work chair for longer periods of time at a stretch.
2. Mental Health
Smoke and mirrors. You appear perfect to people, the perfect and happy person with nothing wrong in their lives. This is the problem with a world that thinks every illness has a face. When it comes to mental illnesses, it’s not only hard to cope with, but it’s also hard to explain it to others.
People believe what they see, and before remote work, it was all about “get up, dress up and show up” no matter how you feel. No fever, no pale face, no fainting, etc. means no illness. But let’s be honest, that’s not true. Employees’ mental state is a matter of greatest importance, and thank God, it has picked up momentum in the last few years. People are now way more empathetic than they were 5 years ago.
What has mental health got to do with work or remote work?
- According to a study by Mental Health America (MHA), people working in unhealthy or toxic workplaces experience higher stress levels.
- Being around people and commuting in crowded transportation can be quite stressful for somel.
- Add to this the daily office work and other stressors at home, and you’ll have a patient whose mental health graph is constantly on the decline.
Remote work helps you take care of your mental health. Here’s proof:
- A more personalized work environment helps you choose your own workspace. It could be a beach, a cafe, your home, or anywhere that makes you feel calm and relaxed.
- According to a PGi study, 82% of remote workers expressed that more flexible work schedules meant lower stress levels.
- Research by “frontiers in psychology” reveals that remote work is associated with the reduction of psychological and physical stress.
Mental health is as important as your physical health, if not more. It’s one of the unspoken reasons to work from home. Why? Because after all the progress and progressiveness in the modern world, mental health is still a taboo in many regions, and a professional might give any other reason to work remotely than say they’re doing it to preserve their mental well-being.
Personal Reasons to Work From Home
3. Personal Ambitions
With remote work, it’s easier to pursue your passion projects and achieve other personal ambitions faster like getting a black belt in Karate or becoming the star chef you always wanted to be.
When you were working in a physical office, the commute and the unnecessary socializing that happened after office hours ate up all of your extra time. By the time you were back home, you were probably exhausted, especially if your office wasn’t anywhere close to home. Weekends would fly off in the blink of an eye, and you became this person who always says “I’m busy.”Were you really productive? That’s another story, but the fact is that you missed out on that extra time that you could’ve given to your ambitions.
If you’re feeling discouraged about your job, remember remote work allows you to do so much more with your free time (now that you have more of it). You’re less exhausted than you were before, so you can use that extra energy to pursue your passion.
When you have more time and money, you can:
- Work on a side hustle to earn more.
- Invest in and work on a passion project.
- Pay for membership programs related to your interests and hobbies.
- Invest in online courses to learn new skills or enhance existing ones.
- Invest in and work on your personal development.
4. Family and child-care
Many people value family time over anything else. For some, it isn’t just about having a chat session or going out together. It’s the physical presence of family that matters. For professionals with children, remote work gives the flexibility to be present for important events in their children’s lives.
When you’re working from home, here are some of the things you get to do with or for your family:
- Attend important school functions and events without taking a day off at work.
- Eliminate or reduce external child care facilities. While working from home, you have more time to take care of your children. No external child care services also mean more savings.
- A part of the money you save because of no commute, no external child care, etc., can be used for family activities. Whether it’s a family vacation or group classes like cooking or gymnastics, working from home allows you to have fun with your family.
It’s not just the remote work environment that helps you do more with your family. Many remote companies provide child care assistance and support and understand their employees’ need to spend time with their children. This is one of the biggest reasons to work from home for most working parents.
5. Inclusion and Diversity
Remote work eliminates geographical barriers and, subsequently, location-based bias. Most remote companies hire from a global talent pool which means there’s a significant drop in workplace discrimination.
According to EEOC statistics:
- From 1997 to 2018, there were 1,889,631 discrimination complaints filed with the EEOC.
- From 2017, the majority of these complaints were under the category of retaliation (49%), race (34%), disability (32%), or sex (over 30%).
Think about the disabled, BIPOC, and LGBTQ+ communities. Remote work is a boom for them not only because they don’t need to relocate but also because they can now work from the comfort of their homes and stay away from discriminatory behaviour. Everyone’s on the same page and the same scale of equality. Work-from-home environments are more inclusive as hiring from across the world is one of the foundations that the remote working model is built on.
Note: if you want to go deeper into this topic, you can watch this video in which one of our colleagues reflects on whether remote work will be the solution to inequality problems in the work environment.
6. Personality Types
While we all know introverts and extroverts, did you know that there are 16 types of personalities and possibly thousands of traits? Every individual looks, acts, and reacts to the world around them differently. When it comes to introverts, most prefer to work in solitude, away from places that put the person under social pressure.
Many people are socially awkward too and prefer to work from home to not be forced to mingle with their coworkers. The psychological comfort where one can be themselves without having any kind of social obligations is why many people prefer to work from home.
There are plenty of remote jobs for introverts or those who simply don’t like to be in crowded workplaces. They no longer need to give up on their preferences and succumb to social norms to earn a living.
Why do introverts love remote work?
- No awkward “water cooler” conversations.
- No unwanted social gatherings.
- No obligation to indulge in small talk during lunch hours at work.
- No more pressure to fit in or engage more.
- Can be 100% who you are without feeling guilty or left out.
Financial Reasons to Work From Home
7. More Savings
We’ve talked about commuting so many times but having no commute is related to so many benefits that there’s no escaping the word. From less mental and physical stress to saving more money, just cutting down on commuting does so much for your mind, body, and pocket.
Now, let’s put a number to this. Did you know that a 20-mile round trip could cost you up to $3,000 a year in fuel? Calculate it yourself. Straining your back driving to and from work every day, toll and parking fees, mental stress, minor or major accidents, etc., could take your car repair and medical bills even higher. Commuting adds direct and indirect expenditure to your everyday budget. Eventually, the $3,000 becomes $10,000-15,000 a year. That’s what you save when you choose remote work.
What else do you save on with remote work?
- Clothing because you don’t need formal office outfits every day. You need them only for your virtual meetings.
- We already mentioned daycare above. Besides spending quality time with your family, remote work also saves you a lot of money on childcare.
- You cut pet care costs significantly when you work from home.
- No more formal handbags and shoes. Who’s watching them from your computer screens? Nobody.
- Social gatherings in cafes or restaurants can cost you a bomb every year. Add to that unhealthy junk food from your office canteen every day, and you’ll lose both your health and your money. With remote work, you can enjoy healthy home-cooked meals.
Now, that’s a lot of money there. Financial savings is the perfect reason to work from home. You can build quite a fortune doing that.
8. You Can Earn Immediately Even Without a Degree
A lot of remote jobs don’t require you to have any kind of degree. You can apply to many jobs across the globe and land yourself a well-paying remote job without having tons of certifications that prove your qualifications. As opposed to jobs in a physical office, you don’t have limited positions and you have a bigger pool of roles to choose from.
Moreover, there are plenty of immediate hire remote jobs that don’t have a long onboarding process. This enables you to take up a job faster, even without a degree, if you need money.
Remote work is beneficial for those who, for any personal reasons or circumstances, don’t hold a degree. They can still earn, and lead a comfortable life and this is definitely one of the valid reasons to work from home.
Here are some remote jobs that don’t need you to have a degree:
- Bookkeeping
- Client servicing
- Data entry
- Virtual assistant
- Social media manager
- Content writer
- Proofreading
- Transcription
One Extra Special Reason to Work From Home
9. Employee Centric Work Environment
For the most part, our work life has been management-centric. From bosses lurking around our work desks to check if we’re working to micromanaging leaders who would leave no stone unturned in pointing out human errors like they’re gods, we’ve seen it all. It would be wrong if we said that remote bosses are perfect, but at least you know there’s nobody peeking over your shoulder.
With all the discussion around remote cyber security, we know that bosses could still be checking our activity from thousands of miles away. But, there’s one thing that is more than consoling. Remote work is employee-centric in more ways than just spelling the death of micromanagers.
Discover all the details about remote work and it’s benefits here.
What makes remote work employee-centric?
- You have the freedom of flexibility. Choose your hours, choose your place of work. The employer doesn’t dictate that for you.
- You choose who you work for according to the pay you want. If your country or region pays out lower salaries, you can look for a remote job in another country that pays well. You don’t need to relocate to enjoy a better salary.
- If you’re unhappy with one remote job, then switching
to another is easier because there are too many remote jobs out there, and like we said before, some don’t even need you to have a degree.
And You Will Live Happily Ever After…
Who you work for, what pay you work for, and when you switch to another are all in your hands, unlike traditional jobs where you were under an obligation to go on a people-pleasing trip to keep your job. Some of you left your kids crying at home because you were afraid you’d lose your job. Some others had no idea what remote work is until they were forced to try it and discover the benefits it brings. Either way, you suffered from obligation or ignorance. Now, you know the power you hold with remote work and it’s time for you to take the reins of your life in your hands.
From unspoken reasons to work in a traditional office, the world has taken a swift turn towards a happier and healthier life for you. You have even more reasons to work from home, the ones that aren’t based on fear or pressure, so let the unspoken be spoken out loud.
The remote revolution has arrived.