What is teleworking?
Who is responsible for organizing and controlling health and safety when employees work from home?
Teleworking means, on the part of the Employer, continuing to guarantee the safety and health of its employees even outside the company, far from internal regulations, controls and security.
This aspect takes on even greater importance when teleworking becomes a structured way of working, even beyond emergency situations, such as a national lockdown.
The HSE (Health and Safety Executive, the British government health and safety organization), has published an interesting study on some of the possible risks that teleworkers may face. For example, from a psychological point of view, if the relationship and contacts with managers and colleagues are insufficient or of poor quality, this could induce severe stress and a relative sense of abandonment towards the work team.
The analysis
If we analyze the risks from a physical point of view, however, teleworking could have a negative impact if workstations and work environments are not sufficiently safe or ergonomic to guarantee serenity and security to employees, so that they can carry out their mission.
Starting from this type of analysis and studies, of which there are numerous publications, it becomes necessary for all employers, when deciding to follow the path of telework, as a stable and structured work organization, to stop and reflect on these aspects, an obligation that is in any case also defined by Legislative Decree 81/08, which requires the assessment of ALL risks during work.
What effects?
There are also other considerations, which are certainly less obvious but no less relevant, because remote work affects the “private — professional life” border.
These two spheres, which in themselves are already very intertwined through the use of digital communication tools such as tablets and smartphones that make everyone always available, almost overlap with teleworking. Work enters the private, personal and intimate space of the home.
Are we all aware of the consequences of this change? How will the effects of work-related stress be calculated and predicted in a world where work and home overlap?
Undoubtedly, flexible and digital solutions for working in the “new normal” are very important to face the near future, but as always, when new phenomena occur, the attention of managers and entrepreneurs must also be focused on studying and monitoring these in order to continue to have control over the working conditions of employees.
