Out of 468 companies surveyed by ACHS, 81.3% have implemented some level of remote work and indicated that they decided to do so in response to the appearance of COVID-19 in Chile.
In a context in which remote work has acquired new importance, the Asociación Chilena de Seguridad (ACHS) has carried out a study to find out the extent to which it is being used in the face of coronavirus.
According to the study - which excluded large companies in Chile - 95.3% of companies nationwide have employees who are working remotely. It noted that there are no major differences by sector, company size or geographic region.
The study found that the sectors which are lagging most in the implementation of remote work are forestry and mining. The regions with the lowest penetration are Maule (78%) and Atacama (64%). In addition, 48.6% of the 468 companies surveyed - all affiliated to ACHS - indicated that they had implemented remote work for their entire workforce.
ACHS also noted that 81.3% of the companies that have implemented some level of remote work did so in response to the appearance of COVID-19 in the country while only 2.6% did so as in response to the outbreak of social unrest in October 2019 and 16.1% began to do so before either event. This underlines the “acceleration factor” of coronavirus in this field.
Regarding the duration of remote work, 34% of companies indicated that it will be a temporary measure while the other 66% have not yet defined an end date. The study interprets this as a sign that “the impact could transcend the crisis, potentially generating a cultural change to the extent that this ‘forced experiment’ has positive results.”
The study also found that 82.1% of the companies that are working remotely have developed mechanisms for complying with the working day, and 74.1% have taken measures to foster employees’ occupational safety and health while working remotely.
“There are figures in the study that are striking and which we did not expect,” commented Gabriel Fernández, corporate affairs manager at ACHS. “The rate of implementation of remote work has been transversal across the country and has affected all segments and economic sectors since 95.3% of companies - excluding local and international corporations which we know will implement it to some extent - have adopted it,” he said.
“It is also striking that many of those surveyed indicate that they have implemented remote work for all their employees and for an indefinite period,” added Fernández.
To learn more about the impact of COVID-19 in Chile, see this article.
Source: Emol