HYDERABAD: With the Covid-19 lockdown across Telangana and IT employees into their second and third week of work from home, we find out if it is any different focussing on work especially with the entire household milling around the home:
Poor data connectivity upsets me
Kiran Chary, Material Expediter, Gaffney-Kroese Supply India. Pvt. Ltd.
How often do you work from home during non-Corona days. Is it different a difficult to work from home now considering everyone else is also at home –shared wi-fi, kids and spouses at home etc?
I work twice from home in a month. I feel that productivity is not up to the mark when I WFH.
How do you manage food when you work from home. Do you cook or Swiggy?
Home made food for all the main meals and Swiggy or Zomato for an evening or late night snack.
What is the upside and downside of WFH?
The upsides are that there is no work pressure when working from home. The homely environment and a flexible schedule are the other positives. The negatives would be lack of clarity in communication and issues with data connectivity.
How call centres can optimise WFH
The Department of Telecom (DoT) has relaxed certain norms for Other Service Providers (OSPs) till April 30 to facilitate work from home (WFH) amid the coronavirus outbreak especially for IT and IT-enabled services companies.
While the outbreak has disrupted businesses, corporates across sectors are asking their staff to work from home, however, many organizations are struggling in operationalizing WFH for their employees.
Atul Sharma, Co Founder & Chief Technology Officer, Ozonetel, says, “As per current regulation calls can be converted to VOIP and connected to agents’ phones within the OSP sites’ local network. The relaxation will allow organizations with OSP license to extend the call from OSP site to be connected to agents’ phones at their home over VPN. VPN will allow access of all the applications that are usually available to an agent at OSP site. Since Ozonetel’s Cloud Agent delivers all agent tools including a phone call in browser, it is a seamless transition. An agent can log into the application using a web browser and start taking calls.”
There are four ways in which this relaxation can help call centers move their operations to work-from-home.
Calls can be diverted to WFH agents via VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol). Agents can seamlessly make and receive calls from their browser. They can access CRM or other data needed for a seamless CX. One system, multiple seats.
Miss the office brainstorming at home
Bharath Suthapalli, Assistant Manager working at a Big Four Company
How often do you work from home (WFH) during non-Corona days? Is it different or difficult to WFH now considering everyone else is also at home – shared wi-fi, kids and spouses at home etc?
Usually, it’s about twice or thrice a month and now it has already been three weeks since I have been working from home. It’s mostly situational, but an isolated workspace at home, can create a work environment almost 60% similar to office. At times, it turns challenging when you have more family members and kids at home playing and yelling which distracts my work routine and scheduled calls. But with practice and planning, I have managed to handle such exige-ncies deftly.
How do you manage food when you work from home. Do you cook or Swiggy?
Cooking has always been my stress relief and in the current situation cooking while working is fun. Over the last one week, I have cooked at least two dishes per day and even created my own recipes.
What is the upside and downside of WFH?
A few positives of working from home is that I save on the commute time, resources at work, the joy of wearing shorts, balancing time management professionally and personally, home food, being able to save money-saving, reduced carbon footprints being able to balance work and life. The disadvantages include lack of effective and prolonged power and internet backup, lack of motivation and concentration, more distractions such as TV and I do miss brainstorming that takes place at workplace.
Aah, the joys of sitting crosslegged while @home
Bandlamudi Sai Varshini,Talent Acquisition Executive at Telebu Communications
How often do you work from home during non-Corona days? Is it difficult to work from home now?
We usually have one day per month as a WFH, which I make sure I utilise it, but now due to Corona lockdown, it is day six of WFH.
How do you manage food when you work from home?
I usually don’t like to order food as I prefer cooking at home. My husband is a professional boxer and we don’t prefer eating out as we are health and calorie-conscious. However, sometimes we get hit by the latenight cravings and we order in, although rarely.
What is the upside and downside of WFH?
Positives are that I can stay chilled, work in my pyjamas and sit crosslegged or however I want. During break time, I get to talk to the family and that relaxes me. And the flipside to it is that it’s difficult to coordinate with the work and families. One has to repeat what I said on email and then on a phone call to make sure I have said the right thing.