Employees of all ages are discovering the benefits of working from home.
Firms that develop their secure online document storage into cloud computing may find it easier to retain staff as they can then provide opportunities to work away from the office.
Dr Graeme Codrington, futurist at Tomorrowtoday.uk.com, explained that there are "huge cost benefits" to reducing office space, while remote working can also increase worker efficiency because there is no need to commute.
"Research shows that such time gains are given to employers by remote workers," he said.
"Flexibility has been a consistent top-rated engagement policy in research for at least the last decade, so anything employers can do to increase flexibility will gain rewards in engagement and staff retention."
Dr Codrington predicted that the boom in remote working will be driven both by younger and older employees, all of whom want the same thing but "for different reasons".
"The Baby Boomer generation – born 1950s and 60s – have been in charge in the workplace for the last decade or so. And although they think of themselves as free spirits and fairly tech savvy, they have in fact proven themselves to be fairly old school in their approach to the acceptance of new ways of tech-enabled working," he commented.
"They’re going to find that doing nothing isn’t as fun as they thought it would be and they’re going to come back to work – probably part-time, probably in flexible positions – most likely as consultants."
These older workers will "get a taste" for remote working, and so will want to bring about a change in office attendance patterns to ensure they can work conveniently and effectively outside of the office.
Dr Codrington’s comments came as the government began a homeworking trial to see whether it is feasible for thousands of civil servants to work remotely during this summer’s Olympic Games.