How Ask Your Boss To Work Remotely The Right Way

The data on remote work is in, and it’s exactly what everyone thought: Prodoscore found that if employees are productive in the office, they’ll be productive when they’re working from home. And there’s no employee more productive than you – you meet all your deadlines on time, you’re organized and efficient, and you’re the backbone of your team. So why does it feel so overwhelming to open up a conversation about transitioning back to remote work?

It can be tricky trying to figure out how to ask your boss if you can work remotely, whether you’re asking for part-time or full-time remote work. However, there’s a formula you can follow which may make the conversation a little easier – read on for 5 easy tips to help you ask your boss if you can work remotely.

1. Scope out the landscape

The first thing to know when you’re figuring out how to ask for remote work is the landscape that you’re asking in. Don’t be concerned about sounding like you’re asking for too much, as OwlLabs reports that 66% of U.S. companies offer remote work, and 16% are even fully remote. Chances are, you may have even been remote at some point during the pandemic, and you may have colleagues or teammates who chose to stay remote afterward.

However, make sure you don’t feel entitled to remote work just because other companies have it. Your boss might be nice, but policies at the company might be strict. Your team might be open to you going remote, but a manager could be a little hesitant about the transition. Know what you’re getting into when you open up the conversation – and consider cultural objections more than anything else.

2. Prepare an explanation

Next, you’ll have to have a reason for wanting to work from home. You don’t need an excellent reason or even a good reason – you just need a reason, one that resonates with you and one that you feel driven by. Your job is to make the reason sound good to whoever is listening, and thankfully, it’s not too hard. Social psychology studies show that using the word “because” when you’re asking for compliance yields significantly better results than simply asking without any reason at all.

Ideally, you’ll provide your managers with a reason to work from home that’s compelling. Think about something that will require your time at home more so than your time at work, such as caregiving for children, adults, or pets, health issues, or productivity concerns.

3. Have some data

After you state your reason for wanting to work remotely, come up with some data to substantiate your claim. Don’t just pull out all of the stats about remote workers being less distracted or saving the company money (though those are good to add for a little extra persuasion). In fact, data from Owl Labs shows that remote and hybrid workers are happier, less stressed, more focused, and more productive than office workers. But that should be the second part of your data presentation, not the first.

If you really want to know the best way to ask your boss if you can work remotely, use data from the source you know the best: yourself. Pull out your performance reviews, your history of productivity, and examples of when you successfully worked from home by launching projects and reaching milestones.

4. Outline a trial run

Next, if your boss is hesitant about the switch or wants to see how it will work, opt for a trial run. Give them a sense of how your days will look – break down your daily tasks, establish key performance indicators (KPIs), outline when you have check-ins, and describe your home office (or show pictures if you’re especially proud of your setup). Also, make sure you have all the latest tools for excellent knowledge sharing and collaboration, such as Slack, Teams, Zoom, or even Hive.

If your aim is full-time remote work, offer a part-time schedule at least, to begin with. Make sure you’re both in agreement about which days you’ll work remotely, when your available hours will be throughout the day, and all the equipment you’ll have. Let your boss see how well you can spread your wings and fly on your own, and then if you meet your benchmarks of success, you can aim for even more remote days.

5. Take “no” as an answer

After your excellent presentation, there’s a chance your boss might still say no. If that does happen, be patient. Make sure you know if there are ways you can earn or negotiate for remote work in the future. And if there aren’t, and remote work is a must for you, that’s something your boss should also know. Don’t rush into quitting your job immediately if they can’t negotiate for remote work in the future, but if you’ve had this talk more than once with your superiors and you feel like it’s going nowhere fast, they should be aware of how important it is to you.

Additionally, if your drive towards remote or hybrid work is about something more serious such as childcare or caregiving, your next option is to go to HR and talk out a compromise. While that’s not an ideal situation, if you find that there are no other options available to you, you might be able to talk out a potential middle ground or access some resources to help fill those needs without remote working.

The takeaway