Nearly half of Australians surveyed would prefer to work from home than receive a pay rise. Would you?

It’s been well over a year now that many of us have had to work from home and for some of us it is a blessing. As much as that inter-personal contact is needed in the work environment many of us have decided that the flexibility of working from home (often in our pyjamas) is more attractive than a pay rise.

Logitech recently completed a survey of Australians over their working situations over the past year and found that 42% of us would rather work from home than receive a pay rise — there is no indication just how much that pay rise is though.

“I think it’s incredible that people would choose to work from home as much as they’d like, rather than take a salary increase. It really demonstrates how Australians have taken to the new challenges of home offices and the importance of flexibility over money”, said Sean Byrne, Head of VC, ANZ, Logitech.

Although many of us are taking video calls in bed and going with the flow of working from home a quarter of people said they had altered their appearance based on how they see themselves on video calls. These alterations include blemishes you may see on the video call, hair colour, removing excess hair, lip fillers, botox, new eyebrows and new eyelashes.

One advantage of working from home for many is the ability to get out and exercise more often without having the time taken to travel to and from work eating into the day. So much so that 40% of Aussies surveyed became more active while working from home.

Working from home has required many of us to purchase new tech equipment with more than half of those surveyed saying their company hadn’t invested in technology to make video conferencing more effective from home — this is disappointing given the compression it makes on those on the other end of the call. 52% of respondents felt they could be more productive with new technology — maybe investment by companies in this area will change in the future as we continue to work from home.

“It’s far more than just headsets and webcams that can help productivity, but specialised conference room products for small to large teams, that help with inclusivity, increased clarity and ultimately a better video experience”, stated Byrne.

Some interesting tidbits from the survey were that 27% admitted to video conferencing in their pyjamas and 5% with no pants at all, 21% were interrupted by dogs barking or jumping on the table while in a video conference, while nearly one in five were happy taking video calls in bed.

In the end a majority of those surveyed felt that working from home allowed them a better work-life balance without having to waste time travelling to work every day. At the same time almost 75% reported an increase in work efficiency when video conferencing from home.

Personally, I do not have a job where I can work from home but having spoken to many who do, they love the balance of spending at least a few days a week working from home. What about you? Would you prefer that over a pay rise? What products have you purchased that helped improve you work from home efficiency?