COVID-19 PANDEMIC AND "WORK FROM HOME" POLICY

ABSTRACT

The study specifically examines Covid-19 pandemic and work from home policy- a study of worker’s productivity in the federal civil service. The various challenges that affected the productivity of work from home civil servant includes, lack of community and teamwork which involves spending long hours with a computer screen and no face to face interaction and communication with remote team members which might not be as efficient as sitting together and brainstorming ideas to work effectively; unmonitored performance and frequent breaks by employees resulting in longer and less work time. The primary objective of the paper are: To examine the relationship between the work from home policy and worker’s productivity in the federal civil service, To determine the factors militating against the productivity of the work from home federal civil servants and to evaluate how productive the work from home policy was in the federal civil service during the pandemic. Both primary and secondary sources of data were used for the study. A descriptive survey design was used with a sample size of 54 respondents which was drawn from both male and female civil servants. Findings from the study revealed that there is a relationship between the work from home policy and worker’s productivity in the Federal civil service. Unmonitored performance of work from civil servants and lack of basic facilities are militating against the productivity of the work from home civil servants. The work from home policy wasn’t quite productive in the federal civil service during the pandemic. Recommendations for the study include; a form of motivation in form of rewards of workers can be introduced to help motivate employee to put on more working hours and increase productivity. The Federal Civil Service commission of Nigeria should organize a training program to educate the federal civil servants on work from home policy. Also, infrastructure for remote working should be made available for remote working should be made available for the working from home civil servants by the Federal Civil Service Commission.