By: Joseph Boll
April 30, 2024
Many Caribbean employers treated remote work as a temporary necessity brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic but meant to be quickly undone as soon as emergency measures were declared over. In countries like the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and around the world, employers have been ushering dejected staff back to the physical offices they broke away from for the better part of 2-3 years. However, Caribbean Employment Services Inc. would like employers to consider whether it may be time to think about adopting more flexible ways of working that could help improve productivity and retention.
Caribbean Employment Services Inc. is a market-leading digital talent acquisition service that aims to connect the top talent from the Caribbean with hiring managers, HR professionals and decision-makers in companies both within the Caribbean as well as abroad. As an exclusively digital company, its CEO, Joseph Boll, has long been a proponent of the benefits of remote and flexible work in a modern world.
However, flexible work is not just about remote work, although that is a part of it. Flexible work is also about hybrid work, that grants employees more leniency to work remotely for a few days out of the week or month; or also shift work, that grants employees more flexibility to choose what times and on which days they work.
There have been several studies that indicate employees tend to perform better and have higher job satisfaction when they’re given more flexibility over how, when and where they work. Granted, not every job can be completed remotely, but there are still options to introduce more flexibility that can give team members better work-life balance.
This could help single parents better manage their schedules to take care of children. It could help employees pursuing upskilling or educational certifications to better manage their coursework with the demands of their professional career. It could help employees who may be dealing with private health concerns be able to coordinate doctor’s visits without missing crucial work time.
Caribbean Employment Services Inc. firmly believes in the benefit of flexible work for both employers and employees, and hopes to see more forward-thinking Caribbean employers consider adopting more flexible forms of work.
(The author is the chief executive officer of Caribbean Employment Services, based on Barbados.)
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