Factors impacting on productivity and Work Life Balance (WLB) during Work from Home (WFH) for IT professionals in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Organizational performance is heavily dependent on two interesting aspects, namely, Productivity and Work-Life Balance. Both such factors are generally opposing in nature. Productivity is a factor that is always anticipated to be maximized by organizations, and work-life balance is a factor that always triggers concerns for employees. Productivity is a metric that has been measured based on the output produced by employees while performing work. Work-life balance has been determined based on the level of management over professional life and personal life. Although the Work From Home (WFH) concept originated and was practiced in various parts of the globe during different time periods, the pandemic made this mechanism a necessity for the survival and sustainability of organizations across the world. Especially in Sri Lanka, with the economic downturn that was expected with the possible decline in operations due to lockdown, the Work From Home mechanism basically provided a key to open the economy back and produced the energy that was lost in the pandemic. IT Professionals in Sri Lanka from different domains of the IT industry practiced Work From Home in different dimensions. However, the WFH concept period during and after the pandemic provided flexibility for all possible IT Professionals in Sri Lanka. This allowed them to explore a full-fledged Work From Home mechanism. This has made them feel that WFH as the norm, and such professionals have become used to the WFH mechanism. However, organizations started to bring their workforce back to office premises with the end of the pandemic, mainly due to a shortfall in productivity and a lack of control over the workforce. Employees who got used to Work From Home, where they managed work and life, started experiencing issues. They started raising concerns over reporting to work physically. This is the trigger point for this research study to identify the factors that are having an impact on the effectiveness of the Work From Home mechanism in terms of Productivity and Work Life Balance for IT Professionals in Sri Lanka. The outcome of this study would help organizations focus on critical factors that could have an impact on Productivity and Work Life Balance during WFH for IT professionals in Sri Lanka. This research study focuses on the identification of the factors that are having an impact on Productivity and Work-Life balance during Work From Home for IT Professionals in Sri Lanka. Factors for the study have been determined based on the literatures reviewed and discussions held with different experts. Quality of Sleep, Job Satisfaction, Time Management, Distraction, Workload and Stress, Social support and Interaction, Network connectivity and Resources are the factors identified that could have an impact on Productivity and Work Life Balance for IT Professionals in Sri Lanka during Work From Home. The research study and data analysis have been performed based on the responses obtained from IT Professionals in various domains of the IT industry. The study has revealed the factual finding that all the factors have been associated with Productivity and Work Life Balance with a positive correlation. However, Productivity is significantly influenced by Job satisfaction, Time management, Distraction, Workload and Stress and Network connectivity and Resources. On the other hand, Work Life Balance is highly influenced by Quality of sleep, Social support and Interaction and Workload and Stress. This research study brings out valuable results for all the organizations working in different IT domains to emphasize the factors in this study during WFH. This could be further explored by organizations and addressed accordingly to ensure the attainment of expectations from the workforce and also by attaining the overall objective of organizations.