Flexible working: Opportunities, questions & challenges
Many organisations were forced to adopt complete home-working suddenly, with lockdown during the pandemic. This has slowly reversed, with increasing time in the office - a report from the Centre for Cities (May 2023) focussed on the City of London. It found that;
On average central London workers came into the office 2.3 days per week, 59 per cent of January 2020 levels
The most common working pattern was two days in the office
Of those who go to their workplace, 31 per cent do so two times per week. That said, almost half of workers went into their workplace for three, four or five days.
In April 2023, the Chartered Institute of Fundraising, working with Charity Jobs, produced some analysis on hybrid working within charity fundraising jobs. I’ve summarised their key finding in the graph below.
While some of these roles will be regional, it’s reasonable to assume many of the 2019 hires were based in a London head office, and the trend shown here is indicative of a wider pattern in the not-for-profit sector (not just Fundraising).
There are benefits for employers in current, hybrid arrangements. The Chartered Management Institute notes in their ‘Deep Dive’ into hybrid working (April 2021); “for most businesses, the best option will be a flexible combination of remote and office work… hybrid working gives employers and employees the best of both worlds, the flexibility of remote work and the collaboration and interaction of the office.”
Nick Bloom has studied this for Stanford University, and concluded in a September 2023 article for The Hill the evidence points to “small, positive productivity gains for hybrid work”.
There’s little doubt that staff, on the whole, prefer the ability to mix working from home and the office. But the experience of working from home can vary significantly – some (predominantly late-career?) staff are likely to be working from more suburban or rural locations, with extra space – spare bedrooms or dedicated office space. This contrasts with (perhaps younger?) staff who may be living in shared houses or flats, with limited space – potentially sitting on their bed, hunched over a laptop. There can be an assumption that younger staff need face-to-face networking, and want post-work social interaction – but research from Morgan Stanley suggests that Gen Z employees are the least keen to attend the office.
Other people will have their own reasons for wanting to work in the office – escaping unsuitable housing or an abusive partner. As organisations move to hotdesking, there can be additional complexity in meeting staff access needs. All of this requires focus, and careful planning, to ensure a positive, flexible hybrid experience which works for all staff.
Many organisations returned to their offices, post-pandemic, in a semi-planned way, to find their old accommodation no longer aligns with changed needs – most obviously because reduced attendance means it’s larger (and more expensive) than necessary. Meetings feel different, with more hybrid conversations via Teams or Zoom, with fewer people joining from the office – so there’s a need for more, smaller rooms, with better audio-visual hardware to optimise the experience for everyone. Work done onsite is often more focussed around creative work and collaboration – which is best achieved through office zones, and furniture, designed specifically for that purpose.
Hybrid working also poses questions around organisational culture; what should it feel like to work at Acme Fabrications Ltd? Is the office a vibrant, energetic place, full of buzz and conversation? Or a quiet space for dedicated, focussed work? Is there a desire for the same vibe across the week? Often Monday and Friday are much quieter – is it ok, or even desirable, for staff to get a different office experience on different days?
To optimise hybrid working, I believe there are eight key areas which senior leadership teams need to agree the approach;
1. How often should staff work from the office? Are there specific days where attendance in the office is required, or a particular frequency of attendance? If so, why? Are ‘requirements’ guidelines, or mandatory? Will attendance be monitored?
2. What’s the variance permitted (or encouraged) between teams or roles? Finance, Marketing and operational ‘front office’ roles often attract quite different people, working in different ways. Do they need to conform to the same guidance? Will hybrid working for the most senior staff look the same as for the most junior? There is risk, and potential benefit, in an approach more sophisticated than ‘one size fits all’!
3. Sometimes leadership teams can operate with cognitive dissonance around hybrid working – simultaneously recognising the benefit of location-agnostic hiring, while stressing the need for staff to collaborate regularly face-to-face. What’s the right way to reconcile these competing priorities? If decisions are made on roles (or hires) on a case-by-case basis, what criteria are used to determine when there can be flex from the norm?
4. If some roles (or people) are officially designated as ‘home-based’, how do policies vary for them? How is equity ensured, vs ‘office-based’ staff? Are these two categories enough, or could there be multiple bands based on location, with varying guidance around office attendance, travel expenses etc?
5. What types of activity should ideally be done from the office/face-to-face? For example, new staff induction, performance management, L&D activity, saying goodbye to colleagues? Often organisations have regular all-staff events – what’s the most appropriate frequency for these, and how best to ensure everyone leaves feeling they’ve derived real value from attendance?
6. What technology is needed to optimise productivity, at home and in the office? And how are office access needs (eg. non-standard kit) met for people attending infrequently?
7. Is planned, cross-functional activity necessary to replace informal, organic collaboration generated when people work alongside each other - watercooler moments, and those “I was just passing your desk” conversations? Are project managers - often working across organisational silos and hierarchies - able to say “I’d like my project team to attend the office on Mondays”?
8. What softer skills training is helpful to support people, particularly managers, working with a hybrid team? Eg. chairing meetings is a difficult skill - more so when attendees are both in-person and remote.
These are challenging questions which ideally need to be addressed in order to ensure an new office is the right size and shape – and to maximise the benefits of hybrid working for employers and employees. Some of this is fundamental, philosophical stuff, getting to the heart of the question ‘What is an office for?’
The good news is that many, many organisations are wrestling with, and resolving, these same issues. And with the right support, organisations can define solutions at reasonable pace, and in an agile way – so the approach can continue to evolve over time.
The other positive from the corporate perspective is financial. Office space, particularly in London, is expensive. In my experience, moving from fixed-desks, to hot desks – plus additional, new space for informal touch-down and collaboration – can save 30-50% of floorspace. So rental savings – or the ability to lease surplus space for those who own their own buildings – should be able to pay back project costs within 3-4 years, while generating benefits in productivity, staff satisfaction and retention.
This is an exciting time – the world of office work is undergoing a quiet revolution, with potential benefits for everyone. Feel free to get in touch with me if you want an informal, no-obligation discussion around the current position for your organisation, and what you might do next.