Firms urged to prepare for Telecommuting Act

MANILA, Philippines — Globe Telecom is urging enterprises to prepare for a mobile workforce in order to remain competitive in line with the Telecommuting Act which allows employees in the private sector to work from an alternative workplace using information and communication technology (ICT) tools.  

While the implementing rules and regulations of the law are yet to be released, Globe expects the law to have a huge impact on companies, necessitating the need for enterprises to be prepared.

Peter Maquera, senior vice president for Globe Enterprise Group, said companies should already be able to provide an environment that allows employees to collaborate and be productive anywhere in real time.

“Given the present-day realities of business, this kind of flexibility is not just desirable but is essential for the digital workforce to adapt easily to disruptive technology.  Taking the digital leap means a more efficient and secure manner of doing tasks while being more cost efficient and reliable,” he said.

Maquera said cloud-based software, for instance, allows employees to easily work together on a project in real time even if they are in different locations as  members of the workforce can access, edit, and share their files wherever they may be. 

According to Maquera, the initial phase of rolling out new technology and convincing employees to embrace change is always the hardest challenge to hurdle, which Globe itself experienced when it began the out-of-office initiative in 2013.

At that time, he said Globe shifted from running office applications on on-premise servers to G Suite, a cloud-based solution that offers a wide range of wireless data platforms.

“Some employees have either become accustomed to the traditional face-to-face set-up or were simply intimidated by new technological tools. Resistance eventually gave way to acceptance, as they found that the new set-up allowed them more flexibility and greater space for collaboration,” he said.

“Any telecommunications service provider worth its salt cannot afford to ignore the gains in mobile technology. The transformation that we as a company had to undergo was unavoidable to future-proof our business. The goal was clear from the onset: to deliver more for our digital customers, we had to start with enhancing the mobility of our own pool of employees. We had to become digital consumers as well,” Maquera  added.