The global pandemic has impacted every industry across the board. But nothing has made a bigger impact than the social distancing requirement. Employers have thrived for centuries on concentrating employees into one purpose-built space for working. The need to keep employees away from each other, away from customers, and at home whenever possible has turned the entire workforce’s approach on its head.

The Work-at-Home Transition

We are extremely fortunate to have powerful internet, cloud services, and video calls all recently brought up to business-quality standards. So out of a unique combination of necessity and opportunity, the work-at-home trend came into existence. Millions of professionals across the globe have been sent home or taken themselves home. The workforce today is conducting as much business as possible from millions of individual home offices.

At the same time, roles are in upheaval as new-normal business plans eliminate in-person roles while creating remote and no-contact positions to fill. What this has resulted in is a sudden flux in the workforce and the full repercussions have yet to be fully realized. Most have not yet realized that the recent changes have reintroduced a hidden trove of skilled professionals to the hiring pool – those stopped by accessibility concerns.

 

The Mandatory On-Site Tables Have Turned

There is a surprisingly vast population of professionals who must work from home – therefore were once excluded from the primary hiring pool. These professionals paint a wide swath of limitations ranging from physical disabilities to family care obligations.  A mere 6 months ago, more than 80% of available roles were considered to have a mandatory on-site component. Employers were certain that projects, security, efficiency, and other priorities could not be met with at-home remote workers. This excluded that vast accessibility-limited set of professionals as a rule.

Now that work-at-home has become mandatory, the tables have turned. Professionals who are already skilled at working from home are leading the curve on everyone scrambling to set their laptops up in their kitchens and guest rooms. Now, if someone is savvy on camera and smooth with remote platforms, employers may not realize (or ever need to know) that some of their best new hires are experienced disabled or otherwise home-based professionals.

 

Ergonomic Home Offices = Accessible Workspace

The secret to this suddenly open workforce is control over one’s office. When accommodating disability in the workplace, special equipment must be requested, tested, appreciated, and a certain amount of personal capital is spent with every change made to your personal workspace. With a home office, it’s all under the complete control of each professional.

As individuals, we all eventually arrange a comfortable home-office environment. We find the most comfortable chair, we build the right footrest, we set up that space heater when it gets cold. Your home office is your castle, allowing accommodation for any need or preference. When every team-member is connecting from their own private home office, there is no effective difference between an employee with a back pillow or an employee with an electric chair.

In fact, the same home office budget for each remote member can be used far more effectively than building a generic workspace. Each employee – no matter how mild or severe their need – can build the office that is best for them.

 

Work-at-Home’s Influence on Flexible Hours

Of course, not all of the workforce accessibility is based on ergonomics alone. Many professionals have unique schedules or responsibilities that have kept them from the main workforce in the past. Mothers with small children, adults with aging parents, spouses with unusual demanding careers, and other unique lifestyles create the shift accessibility population.

They, too, have been reintroduced as an unforeseen result of Work-at-Home. When managers began working with their all-remote teams through home computers, they noticed something: Some employees are up working in the middle of the night, and their efficiency skyrockets. Some employees hold down the chat-meeting in the afternoon and don’t quit until midnight. When office hours don’t apply, flexible hours take control.

Accepting the natural efficiency cycles of at-home workers has forced the new-normal to include a much more flexible view of professional teamwork. This change in paradigm has made it possible for more uniquely schedule-limited professionals to rejoin the remote workforce.

 

The New Normal Workforce Demographics

We all knew that the new normal would redefine more than a few business models. We saw the rapid contraction of roles and have been building the re-expansion of new adapted roles. But some of the side-effects of our new-normal workflow are more beneficial than we could have imagined. The post-COVID workforce applying for remote roles today is more diverse than it was before the pandemic began. When most technical roles are work-at-home, the accessibility of the workforce skyrockets for multiple once-limited professional demographics.