Travel chaos and lost productivity caused by Typhoon Vicente highlight the value to businesses of enabling employees to work flexibly.
As much of Hong Kong struggled back to work following the most serious typhoon since 1999, commuters were forced to contend with travel problems caused by fallen trees, landslips and downed power lines, resulting in serious business disruption and lost productivity for local businesses.
Yet, for some Hong Kong workers and their employers, the levels of business disruption may have been much less serious: research carried out by Regus has revealed that 35% of Hong Kong workers are free to work from locations other than their company's main offices, giving them a way to avoid the travel disruption experienced on Hong Kong's road and rail networks and at the airport.
The research further showed that, if more local businesses were to adopt flexible working practices enabling employees to spend less time traveling to work, 56% of employees would devote at least some of the time they gained to working harder, benefiting their company.
Hans Leijten, vice-president, Regus, East Asia commented, "The less time workers lose to commuting, the more productive they are likely to be. That means that local businesses could have avoided a good deal of the business disruption we've seen following Typhoon Vicente."
Paul Arkwright
Publisher
