Impact of Remote Working on Human Resource Management: The Role of IT in the COVID-19 ERA
Md Habibur Rahman *
Department of Management Information Systems, Noakhali Science and Technology University, Noakhali-3814, Bangladesh.
S. M. Mahbubur Rahman
Department of Business Administration, Noakhali Science and Technology University, Noakhali, Bangladesh.
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
Working from home approaches are adopted by organizations to different extents during the COVID-19 Pandemic across the world. Basically, it is related to the organizational performance viewpoint- where the impact of COVID-19 on human resource management is obvious inside and outside the ICT environment. Therefore, in this paper, some aspects of human resource management are investigated to see the impact of working from home on HRM especially in a pandemic situation. The absence and non-adoption of ICT in different organizations explain why some organizations are away from performing their regular human resource management activities during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. We interviewed 487 workers performing HRM functions either working at home or involved in office space working while approached 642 workers. The paper contributes to HRM functions by providing an understanding of the substitution of remote working during crisis situations. The shifting of remote working results in positive and negative effects on organizational and individual aspects of HRM. We, therefore, conclude that remote working helps HR planning, recruitment and selection, meeting, and work schedule. Further, remote working strategies help work flexibility, improve health and safety, reduce commuting time, improve work autonomy and work/life balance within stay-at-home order to handle post-covid-19 pandemic.
Keywords: Remote working, office space working, ICT, HR functions, organizational aspects, Individual aspects