Businesses don’t trust workers out of the office

Managers are still reluctant to allow their employees to work out of the office, with less than one in 10 UK businesses trusting their employees to work remotely.

This was despite two fifths (42 per cent), who were confident that they could do a better job out of the office, according to new research released by BT and Nortel.

The data was said to show that managers were still stuck in the past, reluctant to move people away from the desk and keeping outdated working models.

The results showed that some employees could be more productive on the road, working with customers if they had the right technology.

However, BT and Nortel failed to highlight the 58 per cent who were not confident of being able to do a better job outside the office, which perhaps showed that some workers are still uncomfortable with the idea of remote working.

However, the fact so few managers trusted their employees to work remotely was concerning, especially with the effect of snow and bad weather conditions we saw at the beginning of the month.

"This boils down to a matter of trust," said John Wright, chairman of small businesses in a statement. "In the current climate, small firms need to be operating at full stretch.

"Last week's bad weather demonstrated the need for British businesses to enable their employees to be productive wherever they are."

According to BT and Nortel, the research pointed at outdated research practices such as presenteeism', where it was thought that if workers weren't at their desks, they weren't working.

BT claimed that business investment in unified communications could help solve the problem, as managers could check the productivity of their staff.