Explain the concept of virtual office. What are the advantages offered by a virtual office?

Explain the concept of virtual office. What are the advantages offered by a virtual office?

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The concept of virtual offices emerged with the concept of Virtual Organizations. Office automation has led to the development of virtual office concept. A virtual office works just like a physical office but devoid of physical space and facilities.

A virtual office is a service that enables employees and business owners to work remotely by providing a range of business functions accessible through the internet. ... A virtual office enables businesses to have many of the benefits of a physical office but without any actual space or desks.

Employees interact with others through portable communication tools such as electronic mail, cellular phone, thinkpad, voice mail system, laptop computer, fax machine, and audio/video conferencing system. Employees armed with these tools can perform their work from any place — their homes, cars, restaurants, airports, customers’ offices, and so on.

Advantages of Virtual Office

Some of the advantages of a virtual office are as follows:

1.     Virtual Office Reduced Facility Cost: Virtual office enables an organization to reduce its cost that is required in setting up a physical office. This helps in reducing real estate cost, maintenance cost, and cost of physical commuting of employees.

2.      Virtual Office Reduced Equipment Cost:  A physical office requires equipment to be used by employees while working in the office. In a virtual office, no such equipment is required. In a virtual office, no such equipment is required.

3.      Virtual Office Emphasis on Formal Communication: A virtual office places emphasis on formal network of communication which ensures the orderly flow of communication throughout the organization. 

4.      Virtual Office Reduces Work Stoppages: A virtual office can work even during some tolerable events which may hamper the work of physical offices such as storms, hurricanes, floods, etc.

5.      Social Interaction and Social Contribution:  virtual office enables employees to engage in social interaction as they can save time because of absence of physical commuting which otherwise consumes lot of employees’ time. Similarly, a virtual office enables those persons to work who might not be in a position to attend office physically such as handicapped people.