A thermal imaging camera installed in the lobby of Naver Corp.’s headquarters in Seongnam, south of Seoul on Feb. 26, 2020. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, March 3 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean companies are adopting remote working systems to help insulate their employees from the new coronavirus outbreak and contain its spread.
Employees at companies that carry out telecommuting are welcoming the remote work in terms of reduced infection anxiety and childcare burden, but employees in jobs that cannot be done remotely due to the nature of their work have mixed feelings of regret and discontent.
Due to the development of the Internet and online networks, users can go online anytime, anywhere, but the sudden introduction of telecommuting systems is causing confusion for some as they struggle to adapt to the new work environment.
In particular, there have been some embarrassing situations due to disruptions in reporting and sharing of work caused by some of the KakaoTalk connections that occurred Monday morning.
“Some junior workers could not complete their tasks because they could not bring their laptops with them as the company suddenly closed while they were working outside,” said an office worker who is currently telecommuting.
Too much interference from companies and bosses, who are concerned about the efficiency of telecommuting, often discourages morale.
A mobile game company was also in the spotlight as it was known to have ordered employees to fill out an hour-by-hour work log and report on progress.
“With the postponement of the start of the school year due to the COVID-19 outbreak, the burden of childcare has been added, and morale seems to be plunging as companies and bosses interfere as if they were giving a tremendous amount of consideration by offering employees the opportunity to work from home,” said an office worker at a conglomerate.
“Some predict that the coronavirus outbreak will lead to more telecommuting, while others say that productivity will decrease due to poor work efficiency,” a business source said.
“It is clear that this will help companies actually feel the need to build a virtual private network (VPN) and cloud business system environment.”
D. M. Park (dmpark@koreabizwire.com)
