Why are so many employees who work from home reluctant to return to the office? It might be as simple as not wanting to use shared bathrooms.
That’s one of the results from a survey of 3,000 employees who work from home conducted in December of 2023 by Jobera.
The survey asked employees who work from home what perks they most enjoy by not having to go into the office. Some of the responses? They’re surprising.
For example, the top perk listed by respondents is the extra time during the week that working from home gives them to tackle household chores.
A total of 23.52% of respondents to Jobera’s survey said that they want time to do their household chores during the week. That might not sound like fun, but survey respondents said that by doing chores such as laundry, house cleaning and dishwashing during the week, they have more free time on weekends.
What chores are employees taking on during working hours? Laundry tops the list, with 54.74% of survey participants saying that they spent time folding clothes between work calls and meetings. About 16.41% said that they tackled full-on housing cleaning during work hours, while 14.99% said they took time to wash the dishes.
That might be surprising. But even stranger? A total of 19.10% of survey respondents told Jobera that one of the reasons they prefer working from home is that they’d rather use their own bathroom than shared office facilities.
That ranked as the second most popular reason why survey respondents are so hesitant to return to the office.
A total of 8.9% of respondents said that they enjoyed worrking from home because they wanted to spend time with their pets.
What might be the most surprising survey result? Only 7.88% of respondents said that the best part of working from home is skipping the daily commute to the office. That’s barely ahead of the 7.15% of respondents who say that they enjoy eating lunch at home too much to want to return to the office.
Then there are breaks. A total of 4.39% of respondents said that their work breaks at home are more enjoyable than the ones they used to take when they worked in an office.
What are work-from-homers doing during their breaks? Jobera reported that 28.79% of respondents said that they used their breaks to lie in bed, while 24.24% took a short walk. A total of 21.21% of respondents said that they called friends or family members during breaks, while 16.67% said that they spend this time on physical exercises. And the lazier? 9.09% said that they play video games during their breaks.