Work productivity could be reduced by the return of the commute

With many firms expecting staff to start working back in the office as the vaccination roll-out continues, new research shows that returning to the daily commute could reduce productivity in employees.

The study from Wladislaw Rivkin at Trinity Business School, Fabiola Gerpott and Dana Unger demonstrates that commuting reduces productivity at work by draining mental energy, impacting our ability to fully focus on what we’re doing when we finally arrive at work.

Wladislaw Rivkin, Associate Professor in Organisational Behaviour, commented, “Because of its regular occurrence commuting is an automatic habit. However, an unpleasant commuting experience like heavy traffic requires employees’ self-regulation to shift toward controlled cognitive processing. For example, employees may need to adapt daily work plans when arriving later at work or decide during the commute whether to pass on information about potential delays to colleagues. In turn, states of controlled cognitive processing deplete regulatory resources and put employees into a resource protection, negatively effecting productivity.”

The researchers recommend businesses implement clever work design, such as prevent interruptions during focused work, as well as reducing draining commutes by allowing flexible working arrangements or at least flexible time arrangements to avoid rush hour to mitigate this.

Wladislaw added, “Although commuting is an everyday experience for most people, its dynamic nature and implication for daily life in organizations have been largely overlooked. Our research demonstrates that commuting reduces productivity at work through draining mental energy and thus preventing immersive states of flow. Leaders should focus on satisfying employees’ fundamental needs by assigning work tasks that enhance employees’ competences and providing employees with decision making autonomy.”

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