Working from Home as a Human Resource Management Strategy during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Indonesian Workers' Experiences

Abstract

Working from home (WFH) is a relatively new phenomenon in Indonesia, sparked by the COVID-19 outbreak. Having family members at home and being isolated from coworkers and bosses makes WFH a different work situation. WFH's physical interaction limits may also negatively impact employee performance. Therefore, this research aims to explore the experience of Indonesian workers who performed WFH during the COVID-19 pandemic and to evaluate how this work configuration affected employees’ performance. By utilizing phenomenology with 10 informants from several business sectors, we were able to focus on the common experiences of employees doing WFH during the pandemic. It was revealed that employees spent more time coordinating and communicating virtually during WFH, resulting in extended and even distorted work hours. Additionally, they ran into several challenges with their reliance on data to do their tasks. Then, in the absence of their supervisors, who are typically supervising of the work process, employees experienced a higher level of output control. Being at home also intensified work-family conflict, particularly for working parents. However, it was discovered that the workers' perceived flexibility was favorable when confronted with those previous conditions. Thus, while not all job objectives were met, perceived performance while working from home was comparable to working from the office. As a result, they intend to continue performing WFH, but in a hybrid way. With these findings, organizations may formulate a more comprehensive strategy for telecommuting as one of the global megatrends in human resource management (HRM).