The future of work is remote work! It's gaining momentum.

With diversity and flexible work styles, and ever since the 'work shift' was called for several years ago, it feels like the time for a fundamental change in the way we work is finally approaching. However, even with remote work, some people may not be able to imagine how they should work from now on, what the benefits of remote work are, and why it should be introduced.

I believe there are still some people who are hesitant to introduce remote work because they worry about a lack of communication or what to do if they can't get in touch. That anxiety is understandable, and considering Japan's business customs, where close communication has always been present, remote work itself might be a difficult form to accept.

Therefore, this time, I would like to summarize and introduce 10 clear benefits that remote work provides. If you are considering introducing remote work, or if you are not very familiar with how good remote work actually is, please take a look. Perhaps there are hints hidden here for building an organization in the future.

Employees can save commuting time.

To start with something easy to understand, it's this: commuting time. Commuting time is wasted. Some people might read books or take naps, but frankly, if you're going to read or nap on a crowded train or during a long commute, it's overwhelmingly more efficient to replace those activities with sleeping in your futon, creating morning reading time, or doing them in a comfortable place.

Sleeping or reading while surrounded by people on a commuter train or crowded train significantly drains your physical strength. In that case, it's many times more effective to relax at home, or to direct that commuting time and energy towards work. It's one of those clear points that no longer needs explanation. First, the effort of unnecessary commuting. This can be eliminated.

Freed from time constraints.

For example, have you ever felt sleepy or unusually unfocused during work? Of course, as humans, everyone experiences this. What's impossible is impossible. Even if you've prepared your condition, there are times when you can't perform efficiently. Even athletes can adjust their condition for a competition, but it's impossible to perform at the same level every day. If you could do that without any fluctuation, you'd be a machine or a robot.

One of the disadvantages of working at a company is the unnecessary surveillance system that prevents you from taking a nap or resting even when you're not in a condition to perform at 100%. You get sleepy after lunch. If you went to bed a little late the day before due to something, your life rhythm might be disrupted. And it's even more so if you're busy. In that case, if you're sleepy, take a short nap and then work after recovering. If your life rhythm is off, adjust it while you work. Your condition is not created by the company; it's created by your body.

That being said, as long as you're working, you're expected to be some kind of professional, so if you can't manage your condition frequently, that's out of the question. However, the sleepiness and imbalance caused by subtle shifts are simply unavoidable. Forcing yourself to work against such biorhythms drastically reduces efficiency. Remote work allows you to work in tune with your own biorhythms, so you're always in the best condition when you start. As a result, you can proceed with work efficiently and reduce wasted working hours.

By the way, ever since I started working for myself and became honest with my biorhythms, I've been able to handle more than twice the amount of work I did as a company employee. Of course, I think there are pros and cons, but it seems to have suited me. If simply changing the way you work can more than double your performance, then choosing the more efficient method feels like a rational way to utilize people, and to utilize oneself.

Being able to freely choose where you live naturally leads to increased work efficiency, and also allows you to enrich your personal life.

I want to live in Enoshima! I want to eat delicious seafood every day! It's possible. I want to live by the sea because I want to surf! It's possible. I want to live in the countryside because I want to raise my children in a good environment! It's possible. I want to work hard, so I want to live in the city! It's possible. I like overseas, so I want to live overseas! It's possible. I want to learn English, so I want to study at Lee Ho-heon! It's possible. Both in terms of daily life and studies, you can make your life deeper and richer, and be able to do what you want in life. That's why you can have focus and motivation for your work.

I believe that fulfillment in life is something fundamental for humans. You can work hard to achieve your ideals, such as wanting to live a fun life or in a good environment. Despite this, I think Japanese people tend to neglect their sense of fulfillment in life too much with just one phrase: 'Because it's work.' If your life is fulfilling, you can work harder than usual. Yet, people say inefficient things like 'it's about enduring' or 'it's just how it is.' They say things like 'don't bring your personal life into work,' and so on.

However, if you think rationally, if workers' lives are fulfilling, it won't at least negatively affect their motivation for work, right? We are human, and naturally, if our lives are in a bad state, we can't exert 100% motivation. Even if we can exert 80%, 100% is impossible. If things go wrong, we might even quit. It means we didn't wish for such a daily life. If you wish for that, I think the only option is to automate all tasks. That's unrealistic. If our personal lives are fulfilling, there's a high possibility that we can not only make up for the remaining 20% but also show even more motivation. In that case, we should pay a little more attention to the fulfillment of our personal lives. Both employees and employers.

That being said, for people like me who love their work, it's not a problem because we can make our daily lives equal to work. (laughs) After all this talk, you might be thinking, 'What's the point?' But unless you're one of those rare workaholics, the fulfillment of your private life directly impacts your work environment, so I think it's something that should be considered to some extent. Remote work allows you to live your private life as you please. That's why the possibility of work being affected by dissatisfaction or circumstances in your private life is greatly reduced. If you live in an environment you like, with a sense of time you prefer, stress will also decrease. In fact, you might even be appreciated.

Not getting involved in office politics.

This is a big one. Office politics. I wonder if many people have left companies because of this. Situations like 'so-and-so is the most important person,' or 'you absolutely have to go if invited to lunch.' Or if you don't go, you're labeled as unsociable. I think entrusting a large part of work efficiency to such daily communication is a failure of project management. Certainly, the more communication, the better, but it's natural for employees to eventually leave and go their own way. That's why I believe entrusting important parts of internal systems to communication and human interpersonal skills is a risk. At least, I do.

It's still fine if it's about lunch or work mechanisms. Factions sometimes arise, don't they? Envying someone. Or whether to associate with someone or not. Some people, instead of leaving it alone, persistently pursue and enjoy it like a tabloid photographer. Or 'you can't go against so-and-so.' Or being swayed by non-work reasons like 'I don't want to work with that person.' In the worst case, it could be workplace bullying. Or conversely, people who think they're being bullied even though no one is bullying them. These are completely unnecessary troubles in the workplace. Even if you engage in third-rate gossip or form factions, 'unnecessary competition other than work results' operates within the company, and there's absolutely no good that comes from it.

It's inevitable that the more people gather in one place, the more unnecessary troubles will occur. By implementing remote work, you can avoid the risk of office politics erupting and work being hindered by trivial conflicts. From here on, this is my personal theory: even if deep communication should be maintained for core aspects, areas that can be made remote should be made remote, and project management should be thoroughly conducted accordingly. I believe this would allow us to avoid unnecessary, so to speak, office-political risks to some extent. All things considered, when working in an organization, these non-work communication issues that arise within the company can be troublesome, potentially even collapsing the organization in an instant if mishandled. For employees, it also eliminates reasons to give up their favorite work due to such extraneous incidents.

No external noise when you want to concentrate.

There are times when you want to concentrate alone, but the surrounding noise is too loud, and you can't focus, right? The larger the office, especially if multiple departments are in one room, the sound of phones, conversations, and all sorts of noises interfere with your work. Also, you might be suddenly spoken to, or often have to stop your work, creating situations where you want to work but can't.

With remote work, this noise problem can be solved in an instant. If you create the most conducive environment for concentration yourself, the only times your concentration might be unexpectedly disturbed are by a phone call or email addressed to you. You can concentrate fully and proceed with your work and tasks to your heart's content. The efficiency that can be achieved by the absence of noise is quite appealing.

Reduces location costs.

Large offices, expensive location fees – these become unnecessary by promoting remote work. Unless a manager has the vanity of wanting to work in a large office, or to have a huge office with rows of people, remote work naturally makes a smaller space sufficient. The office is not always a place where employees are present; rather, it becomes a communication space for board members and management, a small party venue for inviting employees, or a meeting space – used more for when communication is needed, almost like a shared office.

However, a location is required for registration, and as the company grows, a suitable space will also become necessary. But you will no longer need to pay excessively high rent or secure unnecessarily large spaces. You can operate a huge organization from a small base. Many world-renowned companies, especially newer ones, show this tendency. If you search for overseas companies utilizing remote work, you'll likely find several immediately. Companies that have fully adopted remote work include famous ones like WordPress, Buffer, and Evernote. It might be a good idea to refer to their methods.

Specifically, a system that can create a large organization with a small office leads to significant cost reductions, especially for startups and small to medium-sized enterprises. For companies with limited funds, rather than struggling to make a space comfortable, systematizing remote work gives a more cutting-edge and efficient impression. In places like Tokyo, where land is expensive, just renting a small room in an accessible location can result in a substantial cost. Remote work is effective for avoiding unnecessary expenses and also for conveying an image of being one step ahead.

Work evaluation becomes 'results-based,' making fair judgment easier.

Because it's remote work, no extraneous values are added to evaluations. In other words, there's an aspect where situations where people who flatter or smooth over human relationships are somehow tolerated don't occur. I'm not sure if such cases exist much nowadays, but they certainly do in old-fashioned organizations. I often hear complaints of that kind. Situations where a junior who is favored by a senior receives roughly the same salary as someone who is actually producing results, despite hardly working, also disappear. On the other hand, people who genuinely achieve results are more likely to be fairly evaluated.

From the organization's perspective, this is also highly effective. It allows for easier appropriate judgment, enabling a calm assessment of how to evaluate whom to be most beneficial to the organization. When interacting with people daily, one can't help but fall into situations where certain individuals are particularly favored. However, that makes outcomes dependent on personality, regardless of whether results are produced. Originally, evaluations for those who couldn't achieve results within certain standards should convey a sense of urgency. By implementing remote work, situations where one unnecessarily favors or dotes on an individual are eliminated, allowing for more appropriate evaluations based on results.

Ability to hire talented individuals without geographical constraints.

This might be the biggest advantage. Throughout Japan, or rather, throughout the world, there are many talented individuals. And there are also many talented people who cannot work together because they cannot choose their 'location.' For example, mothers raising children. Among mothers, there are those who rose to management positions in major corporations, or were talented individuals at famous management consulting firms. While some want to focus on childcare, there are also many talented individuals worldwide who still wish to work. By systematizing remote work, you can quickly access such talent and work together.

What if this were location-limited? If it's a rural area, you can only hire local talent; if it's Tokyo, only Tokyo talent. In an era where the world is so vast and we are being drawn into a global all-out battle, including international talent, it's questionable whether you can find good partners by searching for talent only within a limited region. There's already a shortage of skilled labor. Isn't it becoming a situation where you need to look worldwide, access and gather talent from everywhere, just to finally build your ideal team? The proof is that even with a lot of money, good talent doesn't come, right?

This is an era where good talent can already work independently. With the internet and a computer, talented individuals who produce results are likely already considering starting their own ventures. They might not particularly care about location. If you want to gather ideal talent within a limited region, you might have no choice but to cultivate them from scratch yourself. If the option is to collaborate rather than cultivate, then you should create a system that allows you to reach out to talent worldwide and enable work across a broader scope.

Suddenly expanding worldwide is not a dream.

Above all, it's remote. Having your company's staff throughout Japan, or even throughout the world, is not impossible if remote work is properly systematized. Rather, that situation becomes normal. For example, if you have a remote staff member working in Singapore, and there's something interesting happening in Singapore, you can have that staff member visit. Similarly, if there's an interesting place in America, you can have a staff member living in America go there.

Having staff anywhere in the world means that the team's functions can connect with any environment globally. This will undoubtedly yield immeasurable effects in the coming era. If there's an interesting gathering, you can quickly have someone visit and obtain the latest information promptly. New businesses or methods might emerge from that. Furthermore, in an age where content is highly valued, having the means to access content from around the world will, in itself, be a differentiator in Japan today.

With staff undertaking remote work located worldwide, even small teams can more easily find an opening to communicate with global markets. And for Japan's future, taking the step to penetrate global markets is full of opportunities and undoubtedly a step that should be taken right now. Remote work holds such great potential.

Summary

For now, I've summarized the importance of remote work and its benefits. However, this is premised on thoroughly solving communication issues arising from remote work through a proper system. There are already several tools available to solve communication problems. By combining them effectively and building a system that allows for communication in remote settings just like in real-time, you can truly unleash 100% of remote work's appeal.

That's why we must study. What technologies are available? What tools exist in the world? How do current websites and apps support communication? How can we use them to run a team remotely? There are already many teams worldwide that have made most of their company remote. We might do well to learn from the methods of such experienced teams.

Let's try wherever we can to enable people to perform their best in the ideal Daisuke style, even without people physically in the office, without daily commutes, and without wasted effort. After trying various things, being able to communicate even more effectively than in-person meetings will become the breakthrough that allows work efficiency and potential to be realized at the next level. By then, a next-generation team capable of managing the entire organization with unprecedented cost performance should have been formed.

From now on, for teams and organizations, remote work is one of the unavoidable ways of working. As the speed of business continues to accelerate, there's no time to waste. In Japan, which is increasingly intertwined with the global market, it's no longer an era to continue relying solely on traditional communication styles. The wasted time that has occurred until now should be used to enrich the personal lives of staff.

However, one point to be careful about is that just because it's remote work, communication should not be completely abandoned. This might seem to contradict what I just said, but what should be cut in remote work is the wasted time and unnecessary communication that has occurred until now, and it's important to return that time to individuals. People can maintain motivation because there is communication. It is precisely because there are colleagues working towards the same goal that people want to work hard for the organization. A daily routine of just working without sharing a vision or a sense of camaraderie is also a form of waste.

An organization where everyone can unite towards the same goal, sharing a vision with "people" on a global stage, not just within the office. When staff can become dedicated and motivated to work hard towards what the organization and team truly want to achieve and what they should be, they can move towards growth. What is tested in remote work is not neglecting communication, but rather whether "people" can hold a vision in their hearts no matter how far they are from the office; it's no exaggeration to say that the appeal of the organization itself is being tested. Let's envision the future. Let's present a world that excites us. That is the very form of work that should exist in the future.