Drivers of long-term work from home adoption in small and medium-sized enterprises: A managerial perspective

The pandemic shifted the labor market resulting in an increased demand for work from home (WFH), leading companies to be pressured into implementing it to stay competitive and attractive to employees. Nevertheless, the managers make the decision regarding employees’ requests to conduct their tasks from home and therefore play a crucial part in the adoption of WFH in enterprises. This study explores the factors that influence its long-term adoption from a managerial perspective. We propose and qualitatively evaluate a model, guided by the task-technology fit theory, to examine the role of the individual, technological, organizational, and task characteristics for long-term adoption. The findings show that individual factors are weighted highest by managers for their decision-making. Those factors include their experiences with working from home and the corresponding trust toward employees, which are prerequisites for the implementation and shape the attitude of managers. Technological, organizational, and task characteristics are key enablers for WFH and are the building stock for its effective long-term adoption. If trust and positive experiences exist, the interviewed managers indicated that they strive to introduce a hybrid model, in the long term, to cope with the changes in the labor market by staying competitive and attractive to qualified employees.