How To Manage the Health and Safety of Your Remote Workers
Policies, support services and trust are just a few ways to support remote workers.
- By Ben Michael
- Feb 06, 2023
As more and more businesses move to remote work, employers must ensure their remote workers remain safe and healthy. This can be a daunting task for any business owner or manager, but with the right strategies in place, you can easily manage your remote staff's health and safety.
In this article, we will discuss key strategies managers should consider when managing the health and safety of their remote employees. We'll look at how to create policies, provide support services, set up effective communication channels, develop trust between team members, and use technology to monitor employee well-being.
By taking all of these steps into consideration when creating a plan to keep your remote workers safe and healthy, you can rest assured knowing that your team is taken care of no matter where they are working.
Establishing Policies and Procedures for Remote Workers
As companies continue to embrace remote work, it's not just crucial that the welfare of employees be taken into account but also that their well-being is managed effectively in this new environment.
A good policy should include clear principles on ergonomics and health, safety guidelines, rules on flexible working hours, returning to the office when possible, mental health support services, and mechanisms to ensure collaboration regardless of geographical distance.
Examples include having designated non-work time so employees have time outside of work to rest and recharge, providing workers with ergonomic furniture and equipment necessary to complete their jobs without risk of injury or pain, setting up secure networks for data exchange between home offices and company systems, implementing flexibility in hours so employees can achieve healthy work-life balance, among other initiatives.
According to Shawn Plummer, CEO of the Annuity Expert, "Creating policies and procedures that reflect the new remote work environment is a key step to ensuring employees are happy, safe, and productive while they are away from the office."
Providing Support Services to Remote Employees
Companies should take a proactive and comprehensive approach to protect the health and safety of their remote employees. This can include providing mental, emotional, and body wellness support services such as educational programs for healthy eating, meditation classes, or access to sleep experts. Implementing processes that involve tracking employee working hours and designating time for restful breaks will help work-life balance.