The Perception of Employees on Work-From-Home During Movement Control Order in Malaysia

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has made Work from Home (WFH), an officially mandated and strictly enforced rule. The WFH concept is already gaining traction across many industries mainly requires in non-essential companies. Most employees are not satisfied with the WFH concept, as COVID-19 has required practically some employees from non-essential industries to work from home for the first time. This paper aims to discuss employees' perception of work from home during the movement control order in Malaysia as employees experience a new environment. However, this paper's research focuses on the effectiveness and challenges employees face when working from home. In this study, the researchers used quantitative methods which employed a set of a survey which included 20 questions. It contained three parts, (i) Respondent’s information, (ii) is working from home effectively for the employees during the MCO, and (iii) are there any challenges the employees face during work-from-home. The survey was distributed among 104 employees in different working sectors in Malaysia who Work-from-Home during movement control order (MCO). Among others, the findings revealed that (i) The effectiveness of WFH affects employees to feel demotivated due to (ii) less interaction with coworkers that cause anxiety and stress levels to rise. This paper brings to light how employees withstand the new norm of working and what the employers could do to embrace the effectiveness and endure the challenges of the new norm of WFH as it may take a long period of time to adapt.