In the last few months, the Covid-19 pandemic has catalysed the largest deployment of remote working across nations as governments implemented stay-home measures to contain outbreaks.

As Singapore, like most other countries in this region, prepares to ease its workforce and businesses back into the office in the coming weeks, a survey has found that moving forward, 8 in 10 Singapore employees wish to continue to work from home (“WFH”) at least half the time or more.  

The survey of more than 2,700 employees, conducted by human resources technology start-up EngageRocket, the Institute for Human Resources Professionals and the Singapore Human Resources Institute, showed that 80% of respondents preferred to continue to WFH half their time or more. However, employees also cited challenges of the WFH situation such as putting in longer hours than usual (22%), family distractions and space constraints (22%), as well as the inability to access resources and tools that they would otherwise have in the office (21%).

With this in mind, organisations must rethink how they will operate and structure their workforce moving forward, where having the option for remote working has become a preference for their employees. This has implications on several fronts, from physical office space to IT and hardware supplied for the mobile workforce. The foreseeable future of the workplace will involve more considerations for downsizing and redesigning of office space, hot desking, and deployment of tablets and smartphones in lieu of desktop computers and desk phones. 

At Samsung, we strive to meet these fast-changing needs of our customers in managing their flexi-remote workforce. With Samsung Dex , which runs on all of Samsung’s 2017 or later flagship smartphones and tablets, a wide range of benefits can be reaped just by leveraging on a single mobile device.

For businesses, giving employees the flexibility to work anywhere means businesses can expect improved efficiency, communication and productivity. Furthermore, besides obvious cost savings by reducing the purchase of PCs and laptops, the office environment could also be  configured more optimally to make better use of space.

For employees who face physical constraints and difficulties in accessing office resources and tools in their WFH situations, having a Samsung smartphone or tablet compatible with Samsung Dex effectively solves both these issues. They only need to connect their device to a monitor¹ or TV screen¹ at home, and with a keyboard¹ and mouse¹, they are presented with a familiar desktop experience complete with resizable  windows, drag-and-drop functionality and keyboard shortcuts.