Experts suggest telecommuting for Sri Lanka’s productivity improvement
With present technology advances not only the computer or Internet but the ability to do everything virtually from mobile phone, it is easier to be working from home.
Telecommuting is an option that Sri Lanka should consider in the face of losing valuable man hours owing to heavy traffic congestion in Colombo and suburbs, several leading telecom and IT experts suggested.
Without technology, telecommunicating would be impossible, they said, adding that a company has to provide the employee with the correct software and programmes to ensure the employee will not run into any problems while working from home.
They noted that the idea is the employee should be able to do everything from home that he/she would be able to at the office.
Sri Lanka has overlooked the potential of telecommuting that could not only help tackle traffic congestion but also serve many other dire unmet needs, hostile to good governance, in particular those of the judicial sector, a senior telecom expert said.
Some direct benefits of telecommuting are its ability of easing road traffic congestion, saving commuting time and expenses by ‘working from home’ or at ‘locations nearby’, he said adding that its larger benefits are to the economy, environment and also good governance – by servicing essential needs, afflicting national productivity.
Meanwhile a retired expert network management and operations and Area Representative ITU Regional Office Asia and Pacific Bangkok, has noted that telecommuting’s direct and indirect economic benefits are averting conventional peak load servicing in entirety by augmenting inadequate sector capacity.
Servicing peak loads by conventional means, contrary to peak load mitigation by telecommuting, involves significant lead time that involves delays, is capital and fuel consumption intensive, he pointed out.
Indirect benefits of telecommuting are numerous. A few of these are reduction of vehicle and road wear and tear, ease of needy parking space, enhancing ‘commute-less’ job opportunities to the rural sector, mitigation of several harmful afflictions – such as environmental pollution; injury/ fatality from accidents, hazards from urbanisation etc, he disclosed.
The current backlog of court cases is reported to have been exceeded 800,000. Typically each backlog case is called up around three times annually. Thus, on any working day, the litigant population’s daily commuting to courts is over 70,000 times and increasing – most just to be informed of the next calling date, he revealed.
Litigants could minimise commuting to courts if e-court services such as those implemented in Europe and some Asian countries using ‘Telecommuting Constructs’ are available, he said noting that E-court service enables, on line partaking in court proceedings, legal filings, accessing court records, without commuting to courts.
However he noted that currently even the basic email services are not provided at courts let alone e-court services.
Madu Ratnayake, executive vice president, Chief Information Officer and head of business process excellence, of VirtusaPolaris, told the Business Times that “as we embrace the gig economy and enter an era of global war for talent, the concept of ‘going’ to work is becoming increasingly irrelevant”.
“People will work from anywhere in the world for more than one company at the same time. Ability to marshal global teams for global work is going to be a core competence most companies will have to develop to be future ready,” he added.
Telecommuting is becoming increasingly popular due to increasing bandwidths of telecommunication networks and Internet based software for communication. “As we all know travelling in any major city is a nightmare these days due to high traffic,” Sushena Ranatunga, Managing Director/CEO of Cambio Software Engineering and Four Corners Lanka (Pvt) Ltd pointed out.
Some organisations do not need all their employees to be in office all the time. They only need work to get completed no matter the location they attend to it, he said adding that “IT is one profession that we can use telecommuting to a great extent with minimum resources. A computer and a good Internet connection is sufficient to fulfil most of the day to day tasks”.
In most of the developed countries software engineers and related professionals work from home and go to their work place only a day or two for meetings, he disclosed.
Telecommuting gives the flexibility for people to work from any environment they like, no matter whether it is a holiday home near a beach or a peaceful tea estate in the hill country, he said pointing out that telecommuting can heavily reduce infrastructure needs.
Training and learning is a major area where telecommuting can play a part. “I don’t understand why students go to tuition classes these days or attend mass classes when there so many e-learning platforms available to conduct training and get lessons,” he said.
“Teachers can do better training online and students can learn from a peaceful home environment. Quality online material also can be provided. By doing this you can save many resources,” he added.