Tired of 2020 retrospectives? Let’s do a 2021 prospective and assess what we have to look forward to in this new year.
1. A vaccine permitting the resumption of working from the office. Much will flow from that, including companies, less excited about the work-from-home arrangement than their staff, mandating a return to work. With 85 per cent of remote workers wishing to continue in that status according to Benefits Canada, there will be battles as employees refuse to return, claiming that they are just as productive from home.
The employers’ position has support. Although some employees may be as, or even more, productive when working remotely, Aternity’s Global Remote Work Productivity Tracker, showed that, on average, Canadian employees working from home were 21 per cent less productive per hour worked. Some remote workers may also have moved over the past year to destinations too remote for daily commutes, exacerbating the conflict further.
The law is that employers have the absolute right to require employees to return to the workplace, even if a particular employee could prove they were more productive remotely, and it is cause for discharge if the employee refuses. Other employees will plead they are worried about returning to the workplace. The argument bears limited cogency with vaccines poised for a mass-scale rollout. But even without the vaccine, the law accommodates safety, not employee anxiety. Unless they can prove their workplace is unsafe, staff must return to keep their jobs.
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See Also:
(1) Alarming number of US health care workers are refusing COVID-19 vaccine
