Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts – December 17, 2020
During the pandemic and with many employees working from home, much of communicating with coworkers and managers has shifted online. Employees have many options and are using most of them.
Video and online chats by employer size
Employees working for all company sizes are actively using a range of video calling, video conferencing, and group chats. Employees working for larger employers have a higher share who regularly communicate online than among employees with smaller employers.
These communication methods are more entrenched in the US, with most online employees regularly doing at least one of these activities.
Online employees in the UK are almost as actively communicating as Americans are. In Japan, however, the shares among both larger and smaller employers are lower than in the US, UK, or Germany.
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Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, November 30, 2020
Meetings! They don’t stop because of video conferencing, video calls, or group chats. This MetaFAQs details the share of employees who regularly connect online using smartphones, PCs, tablets, or even game consoles. The results are split out by employer size to show whether there is a difference between smaller or larger employers.
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Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, November 28, 2020
How do employees communicate for work-related matters? Do they make video calls or group video conferences, such as those over Zoom or Webex? Is there a difference for employees of smaller as compared to larger organizations? This MetaFAQs reports on how many online employees communicate for work by type, country, and employer organization size.
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Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, November 21, 2020
In response to the pandemic, many online employees began to work at home either occasionally or all the time. One way to collaborate and stay in touch with coworkers and managers is through group chat/discussion apps and platforms. This MetaFAQs details the rapid change between 2019 and 2020 using these communication activities by online employees, including results from the US and Germany.
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Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, November 11, 2020
How many employees use their home PC for work? How is this different by the employer’s industry? We addressed this question with the most recent wave of MetaFacts TUP/Technology User Profile 2020.
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Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, October 21, 2020
Do more employees use Apple or Samsung smartphones? How has the active installed base share changed between 2018 and 2020? This MetaFAQs reports on the active installed base of smartphones among employees in the US, Germany, and China.
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Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, October 10, 2020
During the COVID pandemic, many employees were suddenly working from home. Many tapped into their personally-owned devices to get work done. This MetaFAQs looks at the work-related activities being regularly done using a tablet among online adults in the US, the UK, and Germany.
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Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, October 6, 2020
Working from home is a new practice for many employees during the COVID pandemic. This MetaFAQs reports on the use of new home PCs and new work PCs among employees who are new to working from home, those who had previously been working from home, and those who don’t currently work from home. This is reported for employees in the US, Germany, the UK, Japan, China, and India.
About MetaFAQs
MetaFAQs are answers to frequently asked questions about technology users. The research results showcase the TUP/Technology User Profile study, MetaFacts’ survey of a representative sample of online adults profiling the full market’s use of technology products and services. The current wave of TUP is TUP/Technology User Profile 2020, which is TUP’s 38th annual.
Current subscribers may use the comprehensive TUP datasets to obtain even more results or tailor these results to fit their chosen segments, services, or products. As subscribers choose, they may use the TUP inquiry service, online interactive tools, or analysis previously published by MetaFacts.
On request, interested research professionals can receive complimentary updates through our periodic newsletter. These include MetaFAQs – brief answers to frequently asked questions about technology users – or TUPdates – analysis of current and essential technology industry topics. To subscribe, contact MetaFacts.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Do most female American employees use employer-provided PCs? Which employment roles have higher use than others? This MetaFAQs reports on the percentage of American female employees that regularly use an employer-provided PC or tablet, split by work desktops and work notebooks/laptops.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, September 25, 2020
Working exclusively from home
Are you reading this from home? That makes you one of the 391 million of online adults working remotely we found in our TUP/Technology User Profile survey across 6 countries. If you are like the average employee around the world, you are also reading this on your own PC, tablet, or smartphone, and not one provided by your employer.
Home PCs are the new work PCs
Insights professionals in the tech industry already know from personal experience about working remotely. It was not too long ago that many researchers would be balancing notebooks on their knees in darkened focus group viewing rooms while reaching for another M&M or two. (Not that there’s anything wrong with M&M’s). However, most of the world’s employees do not have experience as remote workers, nor are they set up properly.
Working from home and working remotely have already been part of a long-term trend towards digital transformation. From the multi-decades-long move from desktop to mobile PCs, to the decade of rapid smartphone penetration and home Wi-Fi, consumers have more access than ever before. Terms like digital nomads and road warriors have lent a sense of panache to a lifestyle that has a certain effectiveness, if not comfort. However, in many cases, technology products and services have been pushing to generate demand rather than meet it. Many occupations, from factory work and food preparation to restaurant service, are best done in a fixed location away from home. Without question, digital transformation has been sped up in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Those fortunate enough to have jobs that can be done in whole or part from home have continued employment and income where others may not. As reported in an earlier TUPdate, working from home is for the socioeconomically privileged.
The rise in working from home
Employees that had not been exclusively working from home are now doing so. From our TUP/Technology User Profile 2020 wave (fielded in August 2020), we found that over half of employed online adults in the US and UK work exclusively from home. In Germany, Japan, and China, this rate is nearer to one-third or one-fourth. In India, 87% of online respondents who are still employed full-time or part-time work exclusively from home.
Employer size
Working from home governmental mandates and choices by employers and employees have affected employers of all size and types, although unequally.
From February 2020 and before, remote working has been a feature of smaller US and German employers before the lockdowns. Even in Germany, the UK and China, while rates are relatively low, the rates among smaller employers are higher than among larger employers.
After February 2020, working from home is new to employees among employers of all sizes. However, working from home is especially new for employees of large employers. That is the case among all the countries we surveyed and for those employers with 500 to 999, or 1,000 or more employees.
Enlightened employers are few, yet growing
A small number of nimble, enlightened, or forward-thinking employers have risen to the COVID-19 challenge and are providing PCs and other technology to their employees working at home. The number is small, ten percent or less across multiple countries. Employees using an employer-provided work PC that they use at home and not in the workplace number 10% in the US, 9% in the UK, and 8% in India. These are the top countries among those surveyed.
Employees have borne the brunt of supporting their ability to work from home, with roughly half of employed adults working exclusively from home using their home PCs for any of a long list of work-related activities.
While the year 2020 has certainly been singular in the worldwide response to COVID-19, this support by employees has been a long-term trend. What has changed is the intensity of work using home PCs, which has become the hub for many employees.
Home PCs being used for work-related activities
Currently employed online adults have been resourceful using their home PCs for getting work done. Communication is key, with home PCs being used for everyday work email to web-based chats and meetings. Furthermore, employees are using their home PCs to tap into cloud services for storing files and collaborating on documents.
Whether or not having meetings follow employees home is more productive or less so is still open to confirmation. Employees working from home reported major productivity benefits including in their top five: less time commuting, money savings on gas and work clothes, and more flexibility. Also in their top five were human issues: being able to spend more time with family and pets, and being able to minimize the impact of COVID-19, whether by not getting infected themselves or not risking spreading it to others.
Looking ahead
The current situation is unlikely to persist as it is very long for many reasons, many of which are beyond the scope of the TUP/Technology User Profile survey. It is economically unsustainable to have so many employees not employed, underemployed, or doing work that is not part of their main occupation. Many occupations and industries simply do not lend themselves to remote work, such as manufacturing and service jobs. As fun as VR headsets can be, current technology can only support so much. While the current situation may spur stepped up innovation, and that is certainly happening in some sectors, it seems unlikely that changes will come rapidly enough for more than only a few sectors.
Beyond that, employers, many of whom are already fiscally challenged, may be hard-pressed to come to the table with even basic personal computers, printers, and internet connections. Employers certainly have not shown precedent. Historically, most employees have paid for their own technology to do work outside of the workplace, from their personal home PCs, home printers, and smartphones purchased personally. That is especially true for U.S. employees. In TUPdates to come, we will be analyzing more of the TUP results with a focus on those working from home. We will be looking more deeply into the technology they are using for work and play, what they are planning to buy, the brands they are using, and profiling who they are. We will be especially drilling down in the TUP datasets to look more closely at parents, industries, the self-employed, and students.
About TUPdates
TUPdates feature analysis of current or essential technology topics. The research results showcase the TUP/Technology User Profile study, MetaFacts’ survey of a representative sample of online adults profiling the full market’s use of technology products and services. The current wave of TUP is TUP/Technology User Profile 2020, which is TUP’s 38th annual. TUPdates may also include results from previous waves of TUP.
Current subscribers may use the comprehensive TUP datasets to obtain even more results or tailor these results to fit their chosen segments, services, or products. As subscribers choose, they may use the TUP inquiry service, online interactive tools, or analysis previously published by MetaFacts.
On request, interested research professionals can receive complimentary updates through our periodic newsletter. These include MetaFAQs – brief answers to frequently asked questions about technology users – or TUPdates – analysis of current and essential technology industry topics. To subscribe, contact MetaFacts.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
