More South Korean women prefer to work virtually

65.1% or 2,916 employees would opt for working virtually than commuting to an offline workplace, revealed a survey conducted by the Seoul Women’s Resource Development Institute, obtained 4,476 responses from employees in the country.

By gender, the number of people preferring to work virtually was much higher among women standing at 3,475 or 77.6% than men at 1,003 or 22.4%.

Out of those who preferred working virtually, a majority of 53.1% respondents cited the ability to “take care of both work and homemaking” as the reason for their choice.

Others preferred a virtual workspace because they like to “engage in communication through avatars” (19.9%) or because “virtual workspace sounds more convenient” (17.4%).

On the other hand, 41% of those who preferred an offline workplace said they like to engage in “face-to-face communication”.

Within this group, 27.5% believed avatars would limit their capabilities, while 19.8% said “homemaking and other chores would get in the way of concentrating on work”, according to The Korea Bizwire.

READ: South Korea records largest growth in jobs in 7 years

As of September 2021, the economically active population in South Korea stood at 28.44 million, up 427,000 persons or 1.5 percentage point year-on-year, while the labour force participation rate was 63.0%, up 0.5 percentage point year-on-year, according to Statistics Korea.