As we approach the two-year anniversary of the Covid-19 pandemic, it’s no surprise how many people are working from home. More than half of the world’s businesses, including SMBs, offer work from home or hybrid work options to their employees, with almost 20 percent of the world’s workforce working from home entirely – 58 percent of “knowledge workers” – and many others in hybrid arrangements. It seems, regardless of the ebb and flow of the corona virus, remote and hybrid work are here to stay.

One of the key problems with remote and hybrid work is work-life balance. Many of us find we’re taking calls in the evening, replying to emails before we drift off to sleep, checking text messages if we wake up in the middle of the night…it often feels like our jobs have seeped into every corner of our lives, and it might not be healthy. Thomas Merton – American Trappist monk, writer and theologian – once remarked, “happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance, order, rhythm and harmony.” It’s hard to maintain your balance, to say nothing of order, rhythm and harmony, while juggling work, family, bills, domestic responsibilities (you can only eat so much takeout), the gym…

Following laws implemented late last year in the UK, where new employees are now entitled to request flexible work arrangements, and in Portugal, where employers are now banned from texting employees outside work hours (part of the country’s new “right to rest” laws, which have been passed in response to the increase in working from home in Portugal), Belgium has decreed its federal civil servants no longer have to answer calls or emails from their bosses outside working hours. The rule gives approximately 65,000 Belgian government workers the “right to disconnect” unless there are “exceptional and unforeseen circumstances requiring action that cannot wait until the next working period.” It also stipulates workers “should not be disadvantaged by not answering the phone or reading work-related messages outside normal working hours.”

Shouldn’t everyone, everywhere, have the right to disconnect? How do we slow the seemingly always incoming tide of our professional lives?

For public and private organizations in Belgium, Portugal, the UK and everywhere else, Vodia’s best-in-class cloud PBX is the phone system that makes it easy to set and control business hours:

• Our PBX makes it so your team can use their smartphones as their office extensions, without having to give out their private numbers.
• No one has to receive calls outside of business hours – your employees can set these hours with our app, mobile or PC, and they can also use the PBX through a standard web browser, without having to install an app (they can change settings, schedule conference calls or set their devices).
• Separation of work and personal calls.
• SMS and MMS.
• Conference calls.
• Call recording.
• CRM and Microsoft Teams integration.
• When a laptop is closed there are no interruptions.
• Data remains within the PBX, not on employee devices.

The Vodia phone system comprises the most complete suite of robust business telephony features for on-premise and cloud-based telephony. People working at home or working from anywhere particularly love the Vodia browser app because it makes it so easy to control availability. And everything can be managed with our Android, iOS and Windows apps from a smartphone or desktop.

Work from anywhere doesn’t have to mean work anytime or all the time. It’s about finding the right balance, and we think our phone system can help – while making you and your team more productive. Find out how it works and let us connect you with one of our fantastic resellers, sales@vodia.com. And whatever you do, don’t look down. Look ahead. We’ll help you get there.

‍