Companies waiting for hybrid working to die off are setting themselves up for disappointment, a leading Australian expert has warned.
Iva Durakovic is a researcher in workplace design at UNSW Sydney, who has penned two recent articles on effective hybrid spaces and tools as well as the significance of where jobs are conducted.
“Workers yearned for flexibility and autonomy over where and when they worked long before Covid was a thing,” Ms Durakovic said. “They were just told it couldn’t be done effectively.”
In early 2020, when much of the world shut down and people locked themselves away at home, remote work became realistic – literally overnight.
Fast forward almost four years, and employers want a return to the old days, with a growing number of major Australian companies demanding staff come back to offices.
Sixty per cent of company chief executives expect working from home to be a thing of the past by 2026, research by global consulting firm KPMG revealed.
Its survey of 1325 CEOs in 11 countries found more than two-thirds want their workforces back in the office full-time within three years.
They’re bound to be disappointed, Ms Durakovic predicted.
“I can’t see us going back to the way things were,” Ms Durakovic declared. “In fact, I think this is just the start.”
The real reason remote is on the nose
In pushing for a full return to physical workplaces, companies often cite concerns about the cultural and productivity impacts of remote arrangements.
When people aren’t physically together, the argument is that teams will inevitably fracture and fragment.
Likewise, when away from the watchful gaze of managers, those at home are likely to slack off or take advantage of flexibility, some will argue.
“This will sound harsh, but I think the desperation to get everyone back in the office is largely to do with money and real estate,” Ms Durakovic said.
“There’s a huge crisis that the corporate real estate sector and large organisations are facing. They have a lot of money and a lot of space riding on people coming back.”
Buildings worth hundreds of billions of dollars and leases worth millions of dollars are suddenly not worth quite as much if demand for physical space falls – and falls permanently.
“There obviously needs to be a stable way to ensure that corporate real estate doesn’t collapse,” Ms Durakovic said. “But the world and people’s behaviours have well-and-truly moved on.
“The way we’ve adjusted is irreversible now.
“I understand there’s frustration and uncertainty when you’re spending a lot of money on these spaces, but if people don’t want to come in, it’s worth asking why.”
Hybrid is the future
Research by Monash University’s Business School suggests flexible working arrangements promote employee wellbeing.
The study, conducted in conjunction with CultureAmp, found those required to be physically present in an office scored lower across five wellbeing metrics.
“While there’s immense value in face-to-face interactions and collaboration, we need to acknowledge that the world has fundamentally changed, and so have our work patterns,” Culture Amp Chief People Officer Justin Angsuwat said.
Two-thirds of those surveyed who work in a hybrid setting feel better supported, while a similar number have a greater sense of purpose.
A study last year by the National Bureau of Economic Research found the average Aussie wants to work from home two days per week. At the same time, the average employer wanted staff to do no more than one day from home.
The money and the real estate motivations aside, Ms Durakovic conceded that a big bugbear of companies is how to manage individuals and teams when they’re not physically in front of you.
“When you’ve got a company with thousands of employees, it’s a huge challenge. When trying to find a model that works, there’s an issue of scale.
“What works for a team or business of 10 people will obviously not work for a company that employees 10,000 people.”
But being physically present all of the time shouldn’t be the be-all, Ms Durakovic said.
“I’m not an advocate for no-one being in the office. Place has a very important role to play. It’s about getting over this horrible hurdle of presentism.
“Culture is important. People do need to connect, but they also need to retreat, so a balance is required.”
A growing body of evidence indicates that hybrid working arrangements are actually good for productivity.
Ms Durakovic agreed, saying: “I don’t buy into the productivity argument. There’s no evidence to suggest people are less productive working from home.”
What model might offer a glimpse of the workplace of the future? Three days in, two at home? Vice versa?
“I don’t think we know and I don’t think there’s a one-size-fits-all solution,” she said.
“From observation and research, I can say there’s a huge benefit to giving a little bit of freedom so ideas can emerge. You might not get it right the first time, but if you give team leaders a bit of wriggle room to test things out, that’ll get much more buy-in.
“You’ll tap into individuals’ sense of control over their time, space and actions and their willingness to be motivated to do things different.”
Evolution is inevitable
The idea that how and where we work will go back to how it was before Covid is unrealistic.
In fact, Ms Durakovic said further radical change is more likely, as are new challenges in how workers are engaged and managed.
That’s what makes efforts to kill of remote working entirely such a wasted pursuit, she said.
“New challenges will emerge. New technologies will emerge that we can’t even imagine right now. I don’t see us going backwards. The pre-Covid workspace is over.”
Companies who mandate a return run the serious risk of alienating their workers, she said.
“It’s interesting CEOs have an impression that people will be more effective if they are in the office. They might turn up, but it’s certainly not going to do wonders for your culture or your turnover rates.
“Forcing presentism on people is not going to have a positive outcome for anyone. Not for them, and not for the business.”
Instead, her observations and research indicate companies that offer “a little bit of freedom” for teams to explore ideas on how, when and where they work “see a huge benefit”.
“You might not get it right the first time, but if you give team leaders a bit of wriggle room to test things out, that’ll get much more buy-in.”
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