The purpose of this study is to identify and analyse how working from home is leading to stress in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, and eventually leading to burnout. Literature study method was used to conduct this research, where information was gathered by studying currently available articles and research materials from reputed, peer-reviewed journals both national and international. The information and data thus gathered was then analysed; conclusions were made, and recommendations were identified. It has been found from the study that working from home has many drawbacks leading to stress and burnout. This can lead to various physiological, psychological, and social implications in the long term. As such some recommendations have been identified to help cope with work-from-home (WFH) stress. There are measures that organizations ought to implement in order to ensure their employees do not fall prey to stress and progress towards burnout. There are steps to be taken by the individual as well – to cope with WFH stress arising from loneliness, lack of interaction, lack of proper work environment, etc.
TopIntroduction
Work from home has become a norm and culture over the past one and half years as the pandemic took over. It was hailed as an opportune solution to economic and developmental stagnation that the pandemic posed to the world. Yet, different groups, communities and industries now have grown to hold mixed opinions on this alternative mode of going to work.
Technology companies largely view WFH as an opportunity to convert most of their job positions to remote instead of in-person work. This has been welcomed by most technical professionals around the world. These individuals are highly skilled and often self-motivated, not to mention self-disciplined. It is no wonder that they are large of the opinion that WFH increases efficiency by eliminating – for example, the time to commute, among others.
On the other hand, employees in many other sectors are growing increasingly dissatisfied with this mode of work. As countries went under lockdown one after the other in the wake of the pandemic, families continued to stay at home, stopped leaving children at the daycare, asked the cleaning people to stop visiting until the spread of infection eased off. With time, working families realized that they were doing double the amount of work compared to pre-covid times. As a result, WFH is giving rise to various forms of psychological concerns for many individuals as they are getting less sleep and feeling more exhausted in their plight to do office work and household chores while taking care of children.
Working from home has raised stress levels due to several factors. Employees find themselves doing far more work while working from home – as they must handle domestic duties while also carrying out their responsibilities on-the-job. Others identify the lack of office space while working from home as a reason for heightened stress (Times of India, 2020). Not having face-to-face interaction with co-workers for prolonged periods can also magnify stress at work; virtual interaction has resulted in misunderstanding and/or miscommunication regarding certain aspects of co-workers – important non-verbal signals are missed during virtual interaction. As anthropologist Julian Orr discovered during his study of ‘technical repair teams’ at Xerox – many of the most important interactions took place in diners. “The repair teams were doing collective problem solving over coffee in those diners….” he went on to say. These are the deeper issues that cannot be solved when individuals continue to work from home. Ultimately many end up developing a sense of loneliness, which again is so subtle, and they hardly acknowledge it.
WFH essentially affects stress levels in positive as well as negative ways. This depends on the employee's technical skill level, familiarity with technology that facilitates online delivery, and willingness to adopt technology into one’s lifestyle.
According to a working paper on COVID-19 and Remote Work: An Early Look at US Data Published by the NBER, “Of those employed pre-COVID-19, we find that about half are now working from home.” In another paper, Chakraborty et al. also claim that “Half of the individuals (in India) who were employed before the pandemic are now working remotely.” According to a recent study by Bick, Blandin and Mertens, the percentage of individuals engaged in work-from-home has increased significantly across populations around the world, “Before the pandemic, WFH on a full-time basis was relatively more common among older workers (ages 50 to 64), workers without children present in the household, workers with higher levels of income or education, and among females and white workers” (Bick et al., 2021).
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, online communication and learning were growing steadily worldwide as new digital technologies emerged and the global adoption of the Internet intensified. The increased demand for skills that match the rapidly developing digital economy projected that online communication and learning were on track to become a global phenomenon and mainstream by 2025 (Purwanto et al., 2020).