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August 16, 2022

Smart working: yes or no?

Smart working: yes or no?

by Simone Renzi / August 16, 2022
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This post is also available in: Italiano (Italian)

I would like to start this article by pointing out that beyond ISTAT and Randstad Research data I will make some subjective remarks about what I really think about Smart working and the Italian situation of this mode of remote work. I already know that many will agree, many others will totally disagree. This will be a raw article totally averse to the “radical chic” culture that is so fashionable and latent populism, but every now and then it is the case to tell it like it is.

The facts

Reading an article in Corriere della Sera titled “Smart working, in Italy slows down while in EU it increases: here’s why,” data were reported on the number of workers in smart working in Italy and the rest of Europe.

In the post-pandemic only 2.9 million workers are in smart working compared to the potential 8 million workers who perform tasks that could be done remotely, or about 37 percent. The number is declining: how can we be surprised I say?

The pandemic from Covid has been a kind of “test case” for this working mode dictated by a simple business need: “rather than closing the company, I prefer to continue working by enabling people to work from home.” Of course, the smart working mode cannot apply to all work sectors. Imagine the restaurant industry. Certainly a waiter cannot work from home. Many other sectors, however, such as offices, could safely work from anywhere in the world if the subject is paperwork, software development or other activities independent of showing up at a location.

If Italy is lagging behind, it is because something probably didn’t work on the test bench, and asking “what” may not have worked properly brings to mind some geographic reasons, some organizational reasons, and some reasons that go along with data regarding the Digital Divide. In an Openpolis article you can see a graph showing the percentage of households covered by Internet service for each region of the nations of Europe. Italy, especially in the center-south is among the last next to Romania and Greece. This might already be an indicator, but I believe that the motivation should not be sought here, because probably a company that proposes smart working to employees does so aware that its employees have an internet connection or that, those who do not, take the opportunity of saving on travel expenses, to invest on an internet connection even mobile. No. I believe that the real problem should be sought in other…

What may be the factors?

Productivity

An entrepreneur who retraces his steps and decides to bring workers back into the office does so because he realized that the smart working opportunity was not being taken up by employees. He does so because he realized that working in smart working was not being met, or the numbers that were being made by being present in the company were not being made. Whose fault is it? This time it must be said: the worker’s. Because if a worker fails to reap the benefits of smart work where he or she no longer has to spend an average of 200 euros a month on fuel to travel to work resulting in the protection of the ecosystem (money that stays in his or her pocket), where he or she can sleep an average of half an hour to an hour longer in the morning, and where he or she no longer has to deal with traffic on the way home from work, then it is good to retrace his or her steps.

What other reasons could there be?
An entrepreneur has to think about business productivity, and only a moron would go back observing an increase in productivity with the mode in smart!

But can it only be the employee’s fault? In part it could also be the fault of the entrepreneur!

Lack of tools for monitoring

If productivity is the issue, it could be solved with some monitoring…. However, entrepreneurs are often uninformed about expendable technologies for facilitating smart working and how these technologies can help them check their employees’ performance in real time. Smart working cannot be improvised. It is a terrain that must be carefully prepared to make it actually productive; because it should be emphasized, smart working if done right can make a company produce much more!

Politics and bureaucracy behind smart working

Italy is an over-regulated country. Almost no other country in Europe has a legislative system equal to Italy’s. This article by “Truenumb3rs” shows how we went from 20th to third last in the OECD rankings.

Is Politics to blame? Definitely, but I think it is actually a promiscuous responsibility: partly of Politics, partly of the Italians. Laws are made when there is a need to regulate, and the need arises at the point when someone takes improper actions in a still unregulated terrain, ergo, at that point it must be regulated.

It would take some common sense

I can think of the once unregulated, now over-regulated drones as an example.
When the first drones came out, there were no restrictions on use, anyone could buy a commercial drone weighing 2.5Kg and start flying. Common sense should tell people that a drone flying at a height of 300mt if for any reason, such as due to a malfunction, were to fall on a person’s head, it could kill them. Therefore, if drones are foolishly flown at high altitude in the historic centers of Italy’s largest metropolises, it is clear that the government should put regulations and penalties on the table for those who do not comply. So it was that from the first violations of common-sense rules, regulations on the use of drones were passed that include holding courses and exams to acquire a license to fly Remotely Piloted Aircraft (APR), drone insurance and in cases of critical operations requests for flight permits from ENAC.

As far as Smart Working is concerned, the issue is similar, so much so that from September new regulations will be created to apply to Smart Working contracts. This represents a further handbrake on the development of this mode of work.

The protests

Italians also exhibit truly strange, indeed, dare I say paradoxical behavior. Thousands of people pour into the squares for a soccer team but remain totally indifferent in the face of laws that are going to profoundly alter and mark their way of life. There would be much food for thought here as well.

This behavior is not seen in other countries such as France where it is always the workers who take to the streets. Is this then a lack of organization orintent?

Even geography does not help us

Italy is called the “beautiful country,” we have a unique geography that does not induce citizens to focus solely on work. We have hundreds of thousands of attractions, we are totally surrounded by the sea, we have perhaps the best cuisine in the world, an excellent climate mitigated by the “good sea,” we are geographically like a baby in the cradle. We live in an ecosystem that provides many distractions compared to a country where there is no better way to “kill time” by working.

Cultural degree

Let us remember that Italy used to represent “the cradle of Culture.” A total decline is objective, demonstrable through the closing of theaters, the closing of orchestras, poor investment in universities and research, and, in general, the “disappearance of beauty.” A country where the level of culture drops precipitously is a country increasingly enslaved by the system, unable to understand and comprehend, and therefore represented by people who need leaders to rely on who create laws that are difficult for them to understand.

Common sense often stems precisely from culture….

Smart working could be a solution to so many problems related to pollution, to the quality of life of the individual that will see more and more blurring in Italy because of, let’s face it, mostly the Italians themselves, who have not been able to apply the norms of common sense even in a context that is totally in their favor…

Simone Renzi
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