Faculty of Business External Research Seminar ECON | Cem Özgüzel

Business School External Research Seminar ECON | Cem Özgüzel

Date: Tue, May 7
Time: 15:00-16:00
Location: Zoom (please contact begum.guney@ozyegin.edu.tr)

Speaker: Cem Özgüzel (CES & PSE & IZA)

Title: Shift to Remote Work, Productivity, and Well-being

Authors: Cevat Giray Aksoy (EBRD & Kings College London), Nicholas Bloom (Stanford University), Steven Davis (Stanford University),  Victoria Marino (EBRD) and  Cem Özgüzel (CES & PSE & IZA)

Abstract: How does a permanent shift to remote work affect firm-level outcomes? Leveraging administrative panel data from 2019 to 2022 from a large call centre where employees transitioned to permanent remote work in response to the pandemic, we find a significant increase in call centre agents' productivity after adopting remote work. This productivity gain is driven by reduced time spent on individual calls, decreased administrative tasks, and fewer employee breaks. Importantly, our findings demonstrate that these productivity gains do not compromise call quality, as shown by the absence of adverse effects on various call quality measures. Furthermore, high productivity in the traditional office setting carries over to remote work environments. To provide a comprehensive understanding, we supplement our analysis with survey data collected from call centre agents, which sheds light on the underlying mechanisms of our results.