A Contemporary Performance Issue
Commuting is a perfect example of a contemporary performance issue, “traffic congestion can steal valuable time from employees’ personal lives” (Wells par. 1). The typical employee is concerned with the time lost in commuting to work and not spent at home with their family. The family could be spouse, children, pets, parents, siblings etc.…If your everyday lifestyle started with the concern and time wasted just for commuting to and from work, you already started the day with a strike against you. In the past, this was not an issue with the employer. The employer was concerned with what they had control over at the workplace, if you had other problems, leave them at the door. Lately, it has been pointed out that more can be done for the employee in the field of Human Resources (HR). For example, instead of open parking for everyone at the work place, initiate a preferred parking area for those using some type of car pool. This encourages a social environment to and from work, as well as relieving some employee stress. If all of the employees are in some type of rotating pool, then an extra load of stress is being relieved from some of the employees all of the time, or all of the employees some of the time. Either way you look at it, you can hope to see an increase in concentration and performance. As an added incentive, “The Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21), enacted in June 1998, allows employers to offer workers either cash or tax-free reimbursements for parking, mass transit fares and van pooling expenses“ (Wells par. 3). This is further enhanced for the employer since the Clean Air Act of 1990. There are about 100 metropolitan areas that mandate air quality goals by reducing vehicle emissions that cause pollution. Some states like California have districts that require employers with 250 or more employees to adopt clean air measures to include trip-reduction programs. All of this results in employees no longer being concerned with traffic or parking or fuel expenses. This is an attractive incentive for retention and also as a recruiting tool. The advantages of adopting a strong program as part of an overall benefits package are clear. Here are some examples of how some organizations have put this to use:
? Bethesda, Md.-based Calvert Group Ltd. estimates that it cut emp...
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...’ flex schedules. A third of the companies surveyed by Mercer, up from just 6 percent as recently as 1993, offer employees the option of working at home, with modem-equipped computers linking them to the office. More than a fifth say they are considering such a program. Retailer J.C. Penney, for example, has found that home-based telecommuters are the answer to its on-call operations. Recruited in-house from the company’s telemarketing staff, the part-time workers are supervised by phone, e-mail and twice-monthly visits. Prediction: Between 7.5 million and 15 million workers will telecommute three to four days a week by 2002, according to projections by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (Wells par. 5).
I think that with today’s traffic congestion, both the employee and the employer would benefit by having some type of incentive that is geared to commuting.
HR is no longer just at the work place. Maybe it never was. Today, we can find all sorts of programs as incentives for the work force. Are they new or are we just no longer thinking in the box?
Works Cited
Wells, S. J. (1999), “Using rush hour to your advantage.” HR Magazine, March 1999.
Flextime - a versatile work program - permits individuals to determine on when they work, as long as they place in their total range of hours each week. Counting on the leader could mean complete freedom to style their work schedule, or having the ability to decide on from among many predetermined sets of choices. Two (or a lot of, though not sometimes the case,) workers could share one position, every worker operating some of the specified time. That way, individuals will hold, or still hold, the position they need, and still build time to play with young ones or aging oldsters, carry out of different family
A Capital One Financial Corporation has established such workplace by providing mobility and flexibility to their employees in business units. They implemented a concept “virtual workplace” which is based on reconfiguring office space and use of up to date mobile technology. It gives employees opportunity to be more productive since they are able to work from any place they would choose. According to the Benefits Survey Report from the Society for Human Resource Management published i...
In the previous study, the authors stated that there are various studies about the telecommuting include references to corporate attitudes toward telecommuting, motivation, productivity, supervision and employee satisfaction.
Since my freshmen year of high school, I have met peers who rely on public transportation to get to school every day since the school bus system did not serve their neighborhood. They were students who were eager to come to school everyday, relying on MTS to transport them to school on time every day. Similarly, my mother relies on MTS to get her to work on time every morning and home every afternoon. Both students and adults alike have had little to no problems with the transportation system; when there were problems, MTS was able to adjust their schedules or routes to serve the community. A friend who just recently began to rely on public transportation to transport her to school has told me the interesting experiences she has encountered during the time she has used the public transportat...
It has been shown that the benefits of increased investment in the public transportation sector would apply to most, if not all, Americans. Whatever monetary costs Americans would have to meet would be met, if not completely overshadowed by the amount they would save on average. Therefore, based on the evidence available, one may conclude that it is not only necessary and proper, but also urgent to pursue an active agenda towards the increased funding and research of public transportation.
Many different types of workers are constantly connected to work. They work even when they are away from their jobs, often at nights, on weekends and on vacations,
The Web. 6 Apr. 2012. The. Gueutal, Hal G., and Dianna L. Stone (eds.). "Chapter 9 - The Next Decade of HR—Trends, Technologies, and Recommendations".
Throughout the United States there are over eleven million people working at home at least part-time. In cities such as New York, federal legislation put into effect required a decrease in the amount to commuters that drive the city's streets during rush hour. Forced to make changes, Merrill Lynch decided to give the telecommuting program a try. Merrill Lynch started a program where potential telecommuters working at the firm, go through an extensive training course by taking a two-week stint in a simulation lab where they are isolated from co-workers and managers just as they would at home. Some people find it more productive while others realize that telecommuting is not for them. Most telecommuters will find the job comfortable if they themselves are self-motivated and focused.
Ulrich, D., Younger, J., and Brockbank, W. 2008. “The twenty-first century HR organization.” Human Resource Management, 47, pp.829-850.
One of the main driving factors for any company is economics and how will telecommuting allow the corporation to be profitable. The primary saving for companies embarking upon the telecommuting concept is the reduction in the amount of office space required to conduct business. Telecommuting benefits the employer because they have an expanded pool of employees. The skills of employees with commuting difficulties, childcare conflict, disabilities, geographical barriers are made available to a telecommuting employer. Companies are now starting to expanding oversees where the labor price is cheaper for telecommuting. This however can be looked at as both an advantage to the employer, and as a disadvantage to the employee.
The workplace today goes beyond just the walls and ceilings that surround an office environment or office building. According to the International Telework Association and Council, 44.4 million Americans worked from home at least part of the time in 2004, up 7.5% from just on year earlier (Earthweb, 2005). Though it may be very convenient to work from home, the choice can bring its own set of problems. There are financial reasons, efficiencies, and even managing time are just a few to name that bring about many challenges and issues that any remote employee would face in that type of work environment.
Employees are increasingly interested in jobs with flexible work schedules. What factors are driving this interest?
For formulating a more efficient transport pattern, there are some specific strategies. Firstly, government can encourage people to pay more attention to public transit. The actual data about transit use from most cities indicates that transit use is growing in many cities, in addition, some developed cities have been reducing their car use and pay more attention to the public transport (Newman, 1999). Encouraging urban citizens use more public transit is effective in reducing the quantity of private cars. It is generally known that private cars have brought great pressure on urban traffic. Secondly, government can restrict cars based on the “odd-and-even l...
But in the use of the term “technology” today, there is far more associated meaning than automobiles or washing machines. It has ushered in an entirely new way of working, and in increasing numbers of organizations, increased options of just where work associated with a particular job will be done. More employees than ever have the option of working at home yet still being employed either full...
Another argument is that the employers are active during the travel time. In Tennessee Coal, Iron & R. Co. v. Muscoda Local No. 123, 135 F.2d 320 (1943), the court held that the employers “exacted mental and physical exertion from the employees under conditions both hazardous and unhealthy” during the travelling time. Since the workers are performing services for the employer, the employer should pay the worker for their time.