The Effectiveness of ‘Work from Home’ In a Private Service Company

This descriptive quantitative research determined the significant relationship between the effectiveness of work from home and the employees’ job performance. It also determined the significant difference in the work performance of the 300 employee-respondents in terms of their demographic profile. Data were gathered through a self-made questionnaire in the form of 4-Likert scale questions. The work from home program was effective and the work performance was of high level. Based from the results, it was concluded that there was direct and significant relationship between the reorganization, work-life balance and the speed; supervision and work quality; and reorganization, work-life balance and target. In addition, there was a significant difference in the work performance of the employees according to gender and educational attainment. Based from the findings of the study, it was recommended that Human Resource Department develop scheme to identify positions and employees appropriate under the program. There may also be an establishment of proper mechanism for the continuity and sustainability of the program and maintenance of the work quality may be a shared responsibility.


Introduction
The human resource management has become diverse allowing flexibility and mobility in the work environment. For instance, the 'work from home' (WFH) also known as telework or telecommuting, is becoming an HRM strategy that allows employees to work remotely while fulfilling the demands of their own companies. In fact, the past 30 years has implementation of the program.
In order to assess the effectiveness of the 'work from home' program, this study sought permission from a private service company which has the same arrangement. Through the employees' self-assessment, the effectiveness and quality of the job performance were determined. Specifically, it quantified the effectiveness of work from home program in terms of propensity to work remotely, supervision, reorganization, and work life balance and described the level of employees' work performance utilizing the remote work practice in terms of speed, work quality and target. The study has tested two hypothesis: HO1: There is no significant relationship between the effectiveness of work from home and performance level of employees HO2: There is no significant difference in the level of employees' work performance when grouped according to the demographic profile.

Literature review a. The concept of 'Work from Home' in the Philippines
The concept of work from home has been associated with different terminologies such as telecommuting (Allen, Golden & Shockley, 2015), teleworking (Morgan, 2011), eworking (Nilles, 2007), homeworking (Beauregard, Basile and Canonico, 2013), working at a distance (Institution of Occupational Safety and Health, 2014) and virtual network (Mohite & Kulkarni, 2019). Simply put, this practice allows employees to ancillary some or all of their regular working hours to work from home or any site and communicate with others via technology. For Uchenna, Uruakpa, Chinyere and Uche (2018), this practice is seen as an alternative work arrangement in an off-site location where employees use telecommunication to connect to the workplace. This works in various arrangements as full time or part time, formal or informal and company or employee-initiated. When employees work outside the A Publication of the Institute of Industry and Academic Research Incorporated www.iiari.org 4 office premises, they telecommute with no face to face communication with line managers and co-workers. Moreover, Hynes (2014) state that it is accomplished at a geographical distance which normally takes place at the employee's own home.
'Work from home' is certainly not new in the Philippines. There are companies offering wide range of services with employees under remote working condition. However, this program is certainly not common for all companies in the country. As many of the companies are still not open for remote working, there are provisions giving them an option to adopt the work from home system. The introduction of the telecommuting law in the Philippines opened doors for many opportunities both for the private companies and employees. According to Disini and Disini Law Office (2019), this new law protects the workers' rights and promotes their welfare and enabled latest communication technologies be available to connect the companies in wherever locations they are in. The ICT allows employees to perform their jobs at the comfort of their homes. The new law is aligned with the government policy that affirms labor as a primary social economic force. On the other hand, Lopez (2019) cites that the program is on a voluntary basis.
The latest report released by the International Workplace Group (IWG) Global Workplace Survey, as cited by Lopez (2019) showed that 9 of 10 Filipino employees prefer to work under flexible work arrangements. This is prompted by the commuting experience specifically during peak hours in the Metro and other cities in the country where 58% of employees believe that commuting time should also be counted as work hours. Disini and Disini Law Office (2019) explains that the telecommuting was earlier utilized by certain freelancers and become an option even to the full time employees within Metro Manila.
Since then, it has become a viable option for most of the workers living within heavily traffic-burdened areas.
According to Madarang (2019), there is still no concrete data on the number of Filipinos who are currently under remote working condition. However, it was observed that there is a rise on the number of companies offering freelance work online. There are some employees who are currently working from home that expressed satisfaction on the setup.
They cited that the prime reason for accepting the job is because of independence or freedom.
They feel that they are secluded inside their offices. Working from home gives them independence over their time and work targets. Since the Philippines has one of the worst Lopez (2019) stresses that the old habits of employment die hard in the country.
Many local companies are struggling to adopt this system of remote work. Most of the firms with a "long-standing non-flexible working approach" cannot address the system in their organizations. It was stressed that 6 of 10 Filipinos attribute this to the 'organizational culture'. This is the biggest barrier for the implementation of telecommuting in the private companies in the country. This claim was disputed by Porcalla (2019) who further noted that employers are receptive to the law. In the recent survey conducted to the employersorganization, 87% of the Employers Confederation of the Philippines support the telecommuting system. However, their support is conditional. These employers said that the system can be adopted provided that favorable factors are given such as better internet connections. Since this setup relies with ICT for the effective and efficient carrying out of the employee supervision, the faster internet connection is truly necessary. One of the biggest problems in the Philippines is the availability of a faster internet connections.
Telecommunication companies should address this issue for the effective implementation of the law.

b. Effectiveness of 'Work from Home'
The assessment of Lazar, Osoian, and Ratiu (2010) that the work from home is becoming common for people who performs regular tasks from home instead of office is relatively true. This new arrangement allows employees to organize work, family and personal needs. The fairly good part of it is that this arrangement can accommodate employees with disabilities. The other general benefits from the setup includes fewer distractions (Rayome, 2018;Stahl, 2018), less commuting stress for employees (Rayome, 2018;Stahl, 2018;Johnson, 2015), less office politics (Rayome, 2018), less cost for employer and employee (Stahl, 2018;Johnson, 2015) and less meetings (Johnson, 2015).
This was substantiated by a report that shows that only 60% or less time is productive working in the office. However, Janzer (2018) identifies few drawbacks of 'work from home' including different distractions such as family issue, decreased productivity, same A Publication of the Institute of Industry and Academic Research Incorporated www.iiari.org 6 costs for less employees in the office and no opportunity for team building. Companies also worry about implementation costs and supervision of employees' performance. This also can lead to reduced opportunity for development and work safety.
The effect of work from home to the employees' work performance varies. Given that it enhances productivity, well-being and flexibility (Gajendran, 2017;Hamilton, 2016), it also reduces absenteeism and tardiness (Fields, 2018). Relatively, Martins (2019) observes that workers working at home take longer breaks but remain productive with an additional 10 minutes per day. It was found that an average remote employee works an additional 1.4 days per month than these working in the office. In addition to this, remote workers lost 27 minutes per day on distractions while office workers lost to 37 minutes. This allows remote workers to accomplish more tasks than the office workers. However, connecting with the coworkers is surely an issue here.
According to Soujanya (2020), there are intangible benefits companies gain from telecommuting such as increase in moral values, optimal use of technology and low salaries.
The amount of trust given to remote workers is enough to boost their moral values. There are given big responsibility of minimum supervision at work and they are expected to perform with utmost confidence and compliance. This confidence gives the employees a positive aura to improve their work quality and efficiency. Apart from that, as they balance their family and work time schedules, they will be happier and healthier. As such, they will be more committed to their job and reduced absenteeism. The effect on the attitudes of the employees will be reflected in the quality of their job. In the end, the company benefits.
Several conducted studies positively support the adoption of work from home in companies. Bloom, Liang, Roberts, and Ying (2014) assessed the 16,000 Chinese employees under work from home arrangement and found an increase of 13% in performance, 9% increase in the employees work minutes per shift, fewer sick leaves and breaks. It was supported by Beekmann (2016) who found that the remotely working employees in a call center Chinese travel agency were 13% more productive than those working in the office.
Several other studies also emphasized the increased in employees' autonomy (Rupietta & Beekmann, 2016), larger time-space prisms (Hamidreza, Jin & Rojas, 2019), increased creativity and job satisfaction (Singh, Kumar, and Varghese, 2017). There were also  Uruakpa, and Emmanuel (2018) tested the positive relationship between the work at home arrangement and the quality of work while Felstead and Henseke (2012) showed the association of work from home to higher job satisfaction, strong organizational commitment and well-being.

Methodology
The descriptive quantitative research design was employed in this study. Through a self-made questionnaire in a 4-Likert scale, the effectiveness of the work from home and level of quality of work performance were self-assessed by the respondents. The measure of internal consistency through Cronbach alpha was 0.764 on the 40 items of effectiveness of work from home indicators and 0.782 on the 30 items of level of work performance quality.
The coefficient of reliability shows that the items are acceptable.

a. Participants of the Study
The respondents of the study were selected employees of a branch of a multi-national service corporation situated in the Philippine who were under the work from home program.
There were a total of 300 respondents distributed as 250 employees and 50 supervisors and managers. These samples were randomly chosen employees of the company and its affiliated brands. The summary of the respondents' demographic profile is shown in Appendix A.

b. Data Gathering Procedures
The primary data collection started with seeking approval from the company management for the actual conduct of the survey. The author personally conducted the survey within the company premises. Prior to the actual survey, the author explained clearly the purpose of the study. Afterwards, the survey tool was handed out to them. After the completed surveys, the author checked for the completeness of the answers.
A Publication of the Institute of Industry and Academic Research Incorporated www.iiari.org 8  Table 1 shows the summary of all the indicators which assessed the effectiveness of the work from home program. The composite mean was 3.51 evaluated as 'Very Effective'.

Findings and Discussion
Of the four indicators, the highest weighted mean was obtained from supervision with 3.60.
This was followed by work-life balance with 3.54 weighted mean. The two least rated indicators were reorganization with 3.49 weighted mean and propensity to work remotely with 3.41 weighted mean. The overall results of the assessed indicators show that the work from home program of the company is very effective in all aspects measured. The employees believe that the program is favorable to both the employees and the company in all the parameters used for assessment. Although the overall assessment was very effective, there are specific indicators which were rated with moderate effectiveness.
The propensity is measured in numerous variables to show their personal inclination to indulge in the program. This sums up their personal gain on the setup that also applies as their advantage in both the personal and professional dimensions. Of the 10 indicators, nine (9) were rated as 'very effective' and one (1) with 'moderately effective' (see Appendix A).
The highest rated statement with 3.47 weighted mean was on the employees' time for selfreflection and self-development. More and more people are becoming aware of their need for personal space. As Madarang (2019) observed that the prime reason for accepting the work from home job is because of independence or freedom. Primarily, the employees believe that they can do more working at their own pace than just following procedural instructions. Similarly, the concern on performance evaluation was raised with a 3.23 rating as 'moderately effective'. Simply put, the employees doubt the effectiveness of the job performance evaluation in a virtual setting. The performance evaluation is seen with high degree of susceptibility to misevaluation due to the fact that virtual may not be the same as the actual. The issue on performance evaluation coincides with the downside of work from home program raised by White (2018) which includes trust and awkward flexibility. The amount of work differs when gauged with demographic measures. Workers at home feel they will be evaluated less than their colleagues working at the office. As Stieg (2020)  Chinese employees which stated that the productivity increased but affected the work-life balance. The same was the issue raised by Poblador (2015) which claimed that Philippine companies do not consider telecommuting because of work-life balance of their employees.
Although there are setbacks, the employees in the current study have weighted more positive aspects than the drawbacks.

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The level of employees' work performance in terms of speed was rated with a 'high level' (see Appendix F). The employees prioritize immediate tasks (3.78 weighted mean), has limited work interruptions (3.76 weighted mean) and develop work timelines 3.75 (weighted mean). These results are congruent with the studies conducted by Rayome (2018) and Gajendran (2017). Rayome (2018)  The assessment of work from home performance in terms of work quality was measured with all the ten indicators as 'High Level' (see Appendix G). The employees recognized being independent (3.74 weighted mean) and responsible (3.76 weighted mean).
The higher the independence, the higher the accountability of the employees for all wrong actions and misbehavior. Similarly, the study of Rupietta and Beekmann (2016) emphasized that remote working increased employees' autonomy in work organization and scheduling.
The higher autonomy gave employees strong intrinsic motivation to give more effort and accomplish more work than usual. Since no officemate is there to assist them, each worker requires self-trust to their tasks on their own. The less dependence on the help of co-workers gives them drive to perform within the bounds of their limits and company standards.
However, Alton (2017) warned that the measurement of productivity differs from one person to another. The increased productivity for one position may not be the same measurement of productivity of another. An employee can be more productive through work from home but it is not a guarantee for all.
In terms of work targets, the assessment of rated all the ten indicators with 'High Level' (see Appendix H) indicates of 3.67. The factors highly influential to achieving the work targets were identified as time flexibility and stretch (3.74 weighted mean), autonomy (3.74 weighted mean) and technology and support resources (3.73 weighted mean). The    Specifically, Beekmann (2016) highlighted that the work from home practice was highly dependent on the alignment of practice and company strategy.  Table 4 shows the test of difference in the perception of the respondents on the level of work performance when grouped according to their age and length of service. The t-test was used to calculate any significant difference among the variables. At 1% degrees of freedom, the variables speed, work quality and target were grouped according to age and length of service. The results indicated no significant difference in the level of work The results imply that there is no difference with the level of work performance between the younger and older workers. Although it has been raised that younger workers are more tech-savvy, the older workers' level of performance is not left behind. In a similar way, the length of service is not a measure of work performance. Although the company has higher number of new employees, they were not intimidated with the skills and knowledge of the seasoned company workers. As the work from home program offers variety of positions with routinely clerical and administrative jobs, young and old employees can easily acclimate to the scheme.  Table 5 reflects the test of difference in the perception on the level of work performance according to the respondents' gender and educational attainment. The analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to determine the variances between populations. At 1% degrees of freedom, the results rendered significant differences in the perception of the employees based on their gender and educational attainment. All the variables which are speed, work quality and target, rendered p-value of 0.000 which constitutes high significance.
This clearly implies that the perception of the employees on speed, work quality and target differs based on their gender and educational attainment.
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The level of employee work performance can be determined by their gender and educational attainment. As it suggests, there is absolutely clear difference in the level of performance of male and female workers. The statistical difference may be attributed to the rising number of female workers under the work from home as revealed by Oettinger (2011).
Similarly, as Hickman and Robison (2019) disclosed that fields such as finance, insurance and real estate opened their doors to this work from home program, the influx of college degree holders became a trend as well. The work quality of employees is highly influenced by the amount of knowledge and skills they attained from their formal education. The statistical results however do not disclose the more prevailing perception of the two demographics. Therefore, the statistical limitation cannot determine the higher work performance between male and female as well as the bachelor degree holders and higher qualifications.

Conclusion
The quantitative assessment of the work from home program in the private service company was done by selected employees under the work from home program who are mostly younger generation of 21 to 30 years old, female, bachelor's degree holders and relatively new with five (5) or less years of experience in the company. Based on the results, the work from home program is effective in all aspects of propensity to work remotely, supervision, reorganization and work-life balance while the work quality is of high level in all aspects of speed, work quality and target. Results further revealed that there was direct and significant relationship between the reorganization, work-life balance and the speed; supervision and work quality; and reorganization, work-life balance and target. There was significant difference in the work performance of the employees under the work from home program according to their gender and educational attainment.
Although the work from home program in the private service company was effective, the employees' personal time and performance evaluation were identified to be areas of concern. The effect of time flexibility sacrifices the personal space of the employees while there are no clear lines of performance evaluation process. In the long run, the performance of the employees will suffer. For this, the Human Resource department may develop a scheme for the proper identification of positions and employees that is appropriate under the work from home program and proper mechanism for the continuity and sustainability of the