WFH: HERE TO STAY? NOT QUITE
The pandemic ushered in a new era of working from home. Office suites and some entire buildings were left empty, minus a skeleton staff of masked employees left to justify the electric bill. Maybe you swept the dust and spiders out of your garage to bring in an Ikea desk Ikea and houseplant that died after three days. It seemed like Covid pushed our society prematurely into what most think is an inevitability – the time of the Monday through Friday office jobs are largely over. The Office now becomes a time capsule of days gone by. No more conference room meetings or passive aggressive office fridge sticky notes.
But then the world returned to semblance of normalcy. And with that, companies were faced with a difficult decision – Do we go back to the way things were? Or is the toothpaste out of the bottle? And the reality is...we do both. Much like life, there is a gray area. It’s not binary. The best option is a flexible hybrid environment.
There needs to be some workplace interaction. You cannot replicate the energy and humanity of face-to-face discussions over Zoom. Exclusively remote work has shown an increase in employee disengagement and detriment to personal wellness. It can get mundane, without that feeling of teamwork and shared goals in cohesion under the same roof. Despite the advances of technology, there still is a coldness to meetings done over the computer.
If companies provide clear goals and realistic expectations for employees, there should be no question if employees are actually working at home. Organizations should still strive for an inviting workplace environment, and the ideal way is to have a hybrid onsite/WFH community. Employees that work in hybrid settings experience less boredom, increased engagement, and connection with peers. Companies can benefit from placing trust in its employees.
Company managers take on added significance in the WFH scenarios, their leadership and hands-on employee interactions become paramount. Leaders need to focus even more on employee growth and development. Managers must regularly check-in with remote employees to oversee expectations and deliverables. Even if employees are operating from different locations, there needs to be cohesion within the company. Managers should provide a proper cadence for the organization and clarify the team’s capacities and abilities.
Businesses must stay flexible as we move into this new era, what we know now might become obsolete in three years. Companies that are pliable, that bend like the willow and not rigid like the oak will survive the turbulent future.