Compelling Attributes of Virtual Work Environments

Since the importance of balancing one’s personal life and work environment is gaining unprecedented attention in today’s fast paced world, it is observed that many organizations are allowing their employees to work from home.

There are many advantages of using virtual work environments and reduced need of commuting to workplace is one of these. Travelling to workplace leads to physical fatigue resulting in reduced productivity, lost work hours, and loss of personal time. Whereas virtual work environments help employees save travelling time, that can be devoted to the family and for personal development.

Finding smart alternatives to office meetings

No business can operate without meetings. It is found that meetings consume considerable time of employees and on many occasions these are reduced to mundane and unproductive activities. Meetings can also lead to increased overheads including travelling and accommodation expenses of outstation employees, venue charges, refreshments, and other arrangements.

In sharp contrast to these meetings, businesses are shifting to online meetings that offer a plethora of advantages over face to face meetings. Smart meeting applications can transform the time consuming and rigorous office meetings into automated and result oriented group interactions. These online meetings can be scheduled vary easily without any constraints of overheads and travelling.

Simplify team collaborations

Geographically dispersed teams that work on same projects can effectively share their work or files by using virtual real time collaboration applications. The complicated task of bringing all members of team on a single platform can be significantly simplified by obviating the need to create, edit, save, and send files back and forth via emails. It also reduces the time spent in going through the mail trail.

Smart file sharing tools facilitate number of users from different locations to edit or create files without need for emailing. Users are able to work simultaneously on files in a protected environment. The auto save options provided by these file sharing tools also prevent loss of any work. Moreover, users are also able to track changes in files as per real time.

Improving work efficiency by using uniform tools

Travelling to work can consume considerable time and energy and may lead to reduced productivity. Sophisticated mobile applications and smart use of smart-phones can enhance efficiency and simplicity in variety of business processes.

Mitigate stress of saving large files

Saving large files while on the go can be a daunting task due to limitations of handheld devices such as smartphones or tabs. Such tasks often lead to dividing the files or compromising your data. However, you can use sophisticated applications that can help you save data on cloud. Files up to 1 TB can also be easily saved without any stress or loss of time.

Safe email access

Email communications are lifeblood of businesses. Using business email on the go exposes your confidential information or business data to a range of threats and vulnerabilities. You can secure your business emails by using professional business email accounts that grant secure access to your email communications from any location.

Distinct advantages of virtual work environments

Employees and teams can enjoy freedom of choosing their work schedules according their priorities. There is a considerable amount of flexibility as well as autonomy as far as individual time management is concerned.

It is easy to access the office environment from any global location without having to be physically present at a particular place. Entrepreneurs operate businesses at different branch locations without need to travel across to log distance locations. This not only saves time but also money involved in travelling and accommodation.

No place can be as comfortable as one’s own home. It is found that workloads can be accomplished faster if employees are allowed to work from home. Add to this the freedom from everyday commuting and the associated stress and you will appreciate why many modern organizations are encouraging people to work from their places of choice. It can be projected that future entrepreneurs will be able to save huge real estate investments if all employees are contributing their work from their respective homes.

Read More at ; Seven different types of Virtualization

Virtual work environments- challenges

In spite of the broad assortment of advantages, there are few challenges faced by individuals that are part of virtual teams.

It is essential to establish cordial relationships between team members by humanization of virtual medium because there is an absence of face to face contact. There is always a possibility of unforeseen changes of work environment leading top feeling of instability. This underlines need to implement effective change management policies.

There is also a possibility of fatigue as a result of unending hours spent in front of computer screens. It is advised that some sort of positive motivation is provided to team members to deal with work related stress.

In addition to this, every member of team needs to strike the right balance between work and personal life so that neither of these can encroach into each other’s territory.

Go4hosting is an Indian professional email hosting service providing company in operation since 2000.