We adopted remote and hybrid work to eke out the pandemic. It was a massive saving grace.
But a lot of successes had to happen and even more failures were needed to allow us this saving grace.
What were the events that even enabled us to leverage remote work to begin with? Sometimes a reminder of the basics help. These reminders can also help you understand the differences between enablement and adaptation.
Adaptation, whether to remote or hybrid work, requires risk management; a fact nothing can wish away. And to improve the present, one must understand the past
But moving back to enablement, many many factors have contributed (there always are; unless one is satisfied with easy but incomplete answers) ..,
…for today, let us just look at the technological developments that led to this shift.
Before the Industrial Revolution, craftsmen, traders, artisans and painters worked from the comfort of their homes. This was natural to them because there were no fixed workplaces at that time.
After the Revolution, however, people moved to factories and they were now required to be present there to work. The concept of travelling from one’s house to a fixed office space was born here.
If we look at World Wars I and II and the technological advancements that took place during that time, the list is long.
But in the context of communications, radio, telephone and telegraph were the most used mediums for civilians and soldiers alike. By 1957, the space race had further given impetus to communication and satellites became a key part of the global communication realm.
In 1969, J.C.R. Licklider developed the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) which was the first-ever network that enabled the sharing of digital sources between computers located at different physical locations.
And by 1973-74, cell phones and personal computers made mobile communication a reality.
These were all major developments that went on to support remote work eventually.
‘Telecommuting’ as a phrase was first introduced by NASA engineer Jack Nilles in 1972. Even then, he had believed that it was a feasible alternative to work that would resolve issues of nonrenewable resources and traffic.
In 1979, five employees of IBM started working from home as part of an experiment. In just another four years, over 2000 IBM workers were remotely working and this made the company one of the pioneers of remote working. By 1987, roughly 1.5 million Americans were telecommuting.
Then came the 21st century and along with it the Internet Age which accelerated the growth of cloud computing, the World Wide Web and therefore, the easy access, distribution and browsing of information.
By 2000, the Department of Transportation and Related Agencies Appropriations made it a compulsion for companies to introduce and have in place telecommuting policies for their employees.
The year 2005 saw the first official co-working space in the world. It was created by Brad Neuberg in San Francisco.
Remote work further took on because of the emergence of garage startups where young entrepreneurs worked on their laptops with a small set-up.
In 2010, remote work, Artificial Intelligence and SaaS companies evolved. In the same year, President Barack Obama signed into law the Telework Enhancement Act. It requires all federal agencies to create work-from-home policies for every eligible employee.
Since then, remote work has only grown through the years and innovations like social networking tools for enterprises like Microsoft Teams and quick video and messaging chat platforms like Zoom and Google Meet have supported it. In the last decade, remote working around the world has increased by 400 per cent.
To conclude, the remote and hybrid team model of working has a rich history. For long, small groups of individuals, leaders and companies have been practising the model. But the Covid-19 pandemic has brought remote and hybrid work to a point of no return.
The coming years will see a clear shift towards enhancing remote work policies, investing in security technology, effectively accessing larger pools of talent and creating a work culture that thrives on inclusivity.
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