UW study identifies three key factors to successful work from home for young people

A study from the University of Waterloo has identified three key success factors for young people working from home.

The team from UW's Work-Learn Institute has found young workers strive if they can maintain socialization, productivity, and meaningful work.

“Thinking about it from the perspective of that youth demographic, I think what they're looking for in work is often different or maybe more amplified on the socialization front than what more mid-career professionals might have,” said Judene Pretti, Director of the Work-Learn Institute.

Pretti says younger workers are also typically newer workers, meaning they may not have built the same mentorship and support relationships.

“So that socialization piece, I think, becomes even more important, one in a remote setting and two for that youth population,” she said.

Meantime, students did point to a number of benefits of working from home, like not having to devote a chunk of the day to commuting, but Pretti said a lack of structure can present an obstacle to productivity.

“In fact, the students said that their self-direction was one of the key skills that was important for them to be successful with remote,” said Pretti, adding students also said they would coach others on the importance of it.

As far as keeping productivity and morale up, Pretti had two main tips.

“Looking for opportunities for informal connections,” said Pretti. “So not relying only on the weekly meetings where people are discussing the work projects that are underway but finding ways, creatively, to have people connect in a more social and less formal way.”

Pretti also pointed to a need to coach young workers to be proactive.

“So raising their hand to say 'hey, I could help with that project',” said Pretti. “If you were managing a team of people in this environment you would want to make sure that was sort of the ground rules for how the team would operate.”

“You expect there to be a level of proactiveness or initiative-taking to say 'hey, I can help with this' or 'hey, I'm overwhelmed on this, can someone help out?” Pretti said. “The opportunities for doing that in a face-to-face environment can be more happenstance, whereas in managing remote teams that's something that has to be more intentionally incorporated.”