Revealed: up to date – 11:58 pm, Thu – 21 Jul 22
Representative photo (Supplied: IANSPhoto).
Hyderabad: While IT companies are seeing a gradual increase in the number of employees returning to work, Do Business from Home (WFH) will continue for another year during the COVID pandemic. The new guidelines issued by the Department of Commerce are expected to bring more flexibility in the office.
A new rule (Rule 43A) incorporated in the Special Financial Sector Guidelines, 2006, allows workers who are quickly disabled, traveling and those working offsite to go for WFH. In response to the rules, WFH will be increased to a maximum of fifty percent of employees. The Reform Commissioner (DC) of the SEZ can extend this quantum or additional period, if required.
SEZ models, whose employees are already working from residence, can seek approval in 90 days. Businesses will have to offer the necessary gear and secure connectivity to work from residence.
What the brand new guidelines mean for business
In response to Manisha Sabu, president of Hyderabad Software Program Enterprises, the new guidelines set the stage for a gradual return of workers to workplaces. “The idea of the office has changed in the last two years. Tier 2 and 3 locations are now on the radar of more companies than ever before. There has been an increase of 24 per cent in manpower recruitment in the last one year. While the growth of the additional workplace real property sector has slowed slightly, it is one of many metrics to measure the expansion of an organization or sector,” she said, adding that WFH will boost demand for co-working areas, home appliances furnishings and various infrastructure even in small towns.
The evolving work guidelines will additionally lead to some modifications to human resource practices step by step. “The content of supply letters is subject to change. Despite the fact that with WFH the travel requirements have come down, companies are not going to make downward changes in the salary package,” she said.
There will be cuts in spending on utilities equal to energy, water, food and other services. Nevertheless, the financial savings in these will offset increased spending on strengthening knowledge security and privacy tools.
In response, systems integrators and end customers of international functionality centers decide whether they need staff tailored for them to do business from home or work. “Now we have to align the sources according to the needs of the buyer,” she said.
In the words of Oruganti Venkateswaralu, President, Kompally IT Entrepreneurs Affiliation, WFH has helped increase productivity as it reduced travel pressure and gave employees more flexibility. Again, some workers suffered from high quality of work because they did not have a reliable web connection, erratic energy supply points and lack of coordination with fellow employees and groups. He said that the efficiency of the employees working from home can also be closely monitored.
tangible asset
Many companies were waiting for their employees to return to the workplace. The WFH ratio has now been pegged at 50 per cent in the new SEZ guidelines. In the short- to medium-term time frame, it is not helpful for SEZs,” said Samson Arthur, Senior Department Director – Hyderabad, Knight Frank India. “The number of people working from workplaces is increasing – earlier it was 100 per cent WFH, then 25 per cent come to office, now 50 per cent will come. This is a positive thing and more employees will follow it. Leases will see some time pressure, but The demand for the office sector is not going to decrease.