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Working from home is more productive than going to the office, U.K. data shows

Working from home can be more productive than going into the office, according to data released by the U.K.’s Office for National Statistics.


Despite high productivity levels while working from home, as shown in the U.K. and Canada, some experts worry about burnout as increased productivity can lead to more stress.

Courtney Greenberg - National Post

A main point of the report revealed that October to December 2021 was the first quarter “in which output per worker was above pre-coronavirus pandemic levels” by 2.3 per cent. During the same time period, output per hour worked was also higher than the 2019 average. These findings indicate that productivity was not hugely impacted by working from home, even with the spread of the Omicron variant.

The report — which is an estimate based on U.K. gross domestic product and the most recent labour market statistics — is insightful but not final.

“I would say we have learned to work from home in a way that avoids significant productivity losses, but that’s as far as I would go,” Bart Van Ark, a professor of productivity studies at the University of Manchester, told the Daily Mail.

Researchers in Canada looked into the productivity of employees switching to remote work (or teleworking) after being in an office before the pandemic. The majority of them — 90 per cent — said they were “at least as productive at home,” in the Statistics Canada study released in April 2021.

“More than half (58%) reported accomplishing about the same amount of work per hour while roughly one third (32%) reported accomplishing more work per hour,” the report explained. “The remaining 10% mentioned that they accomplished less work per hour while working at home than they did previously in their usual place of work.”

Despite the increased productivity working at home — as shown in the U.K. and Canada — some experts worry about burnout and stress.

“I don’t think it’s an expectation so much in terms of companies saying, ‘Well, now you can work 10 hours a day.’ I think the expectation is around the production,” Janet Candido, founder and principal of Candido Consulting Group, told CTV News. “They’re burning out. They’re exhausted.”

Output in the U.K. report was measured by “gross value added (GVA) in chained volume measures (CVM), which is an estimate of the volume of goods and services produced for final use by an industry, and in aggregate for the UK, after adjusting for price changes. It is calculated as turnover (sales) minus purchases (intermediate consumption).”

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