When Covid struck, businesses and employees pivoted to home working in a matter of days. Most of us assumed it would be a temporary arrangement. But, three years on, employers are still grappling with hybrid working – and getting people to come back to the office is proving to be harder than we thought.
It’s not through lack of trying. We’ve seen many organisations try (and fail) to force employees to return. Even the CEO of Zoom has asked employees to come back. It says a lot when the leader of the virtual meetings empire admits it’s harder to build trust and innovate in, um, virtual meetings.
Actions like this are often met with a backlash, so naturally many leaders are trying to soften the blow with everything from free beer and lunches to yoga lessons. Unfortunately, the data shows that these tactics won’t cut it.
A key problem for many CEOs is that until now, there’s been very little evidence to support their instinct to recall employees to the mothership. People like leaders to follow their gut, but there’s a limit – especially when it means sacrificing time and money to get to the office.
“All of which poses a moral dilemma for organisations. How do they tackle these longer-term challenges, while meeting the personal, financial and wellbeing needs of employees who prefer to work from home more?”
That’s why Ipsos conducted a study of 1,400 full-time UK office workers. We wanted to understand the impact of remote and hybrid working, and if there’s a happy medium somewhere. We found that employees are more likely to recommend their employer as a great place to work when they spend three to four days in the office vs when they work mostly from home, and that this is also the best working pattern for innovation, transparent decision making and career development. We also found that more than half of 18-24-year-olds report feeling ‘always’ or ‘frequently’ lonely when they work from home most of the week.
