Here comes hybrid working – are you ready?

At the height of the pandemic up to 90% of employees worked remotely, according to management consultancy Boston Consulting Group, as countries advised employees to work from home to limit the spread of the virus.¹

Now as restrictions ease and businesses return to the office, managers and employees are weighing the benefits of remote working against the advantages of a shared physical space.

Pioneers of hybrid working

A swathe of corporations have announced moves towards hybrid working, including Cisco, Microsoft, Aviva, Quora, Dropbox and Spotify. HSBC was an early adopter of the hybrid model, reducing its global office footprint 10% since the start of the pandemic. Smaller businesses, too, are shifting to a hybrid model. According to a survey by Open Access Government of 500 UK SMEs, over a quarter are replanning to downsize their offices as soon as their lease allows.² Hybrid working is also gaining traction with businesses in Asia, with 82% planning to keep remote working in place once the pandemic is over for a more flexible and hybrid workplace. This sentiment is shared by both SMEs (78%) and larger enterprises (87%).³

According to Boston Consulting there are five possible models for the workplace of the future, ranging from the fully co-located nine-to-five, to wholly remote working. Hybrid structures involve alternating days or weeks in the office, office attendance on demand, or connected remote working.

Reimagining the workplace

“We have an opportunity to unlearn the bad habits of the past – many of our ways of working are from the Industrial Revolution and no longer fit for purpose. So we have the chance to re-design work that is flexible, sustainable and high-performing,” explains Dr Anna Gurun, Director of the Future of Work Consortium which represents more than 100 corporations worldwide.

The early signs are positive. Businesses that made the switch to hybrid working achieved an up to 40% boost in productivity and reduced absenteeism by the same proportion, Boston Consulting found.⁴ A separate study found that 89% of employees hoped to be able to work from home at least some of the time post-pandemic.⁵

The challenge to businesses

However, nearly half of the employees McKinsey surveyed globally between December 2020 and January 2021 reported experiencing at least some level of burnout, especially if there was a lack of clear communication within their organisation.⁶

"I think there is a danger in generalising [that] hybrid working equals more productivity,” says Paolo Moscuzza, a Chartered Psychologist and Partner at OE Cam LLP, a consultancy specialising in organisational change. “Short-term productivity managed badly, in some cases, can be counterproductive to longer-term effectiveness, for example, everyone hits their targets but the culture is ignored and then recruitment and retention become major issues and that hits productivity longer term."

A sustainable model post-pandemic

Although hybrid working has the potential to boost productivity and reduce real-estate costs, will those gains last beyond the pandemic?

The shift towards hot-desking and flexible working comes with specific challenges, including the risk of digital burnout and fewer opportunities for informal learning.

A sense of belonging has been eroded since the pandemic, as businesses have become increasingly siloed, with mental health issues on the rise. Microsoft reported that after a couple of months in lockdown, 91% of its employees said they felt connected to their team, but that fell to 75% by November 2020.⁷

To thrive beyond the pandemic, businesses need to source feedback from employees around working preferences early. Boston Consulting advised companies to tailor office working to their specific challenges, depending on the need for client interaction, workplace supervision, collaboration and innovation.

Adapting to a post-pandemic world will require leadership muscle, alignment with customer values and migration, and investment in digital infrastructure. How companies manage the return to the workplace will be key for productivity, worker satisfaction and future innovation.

Moscuzza says: “The organisations we’ve been impressed by aren’t just thinking about right now, they’re thinking about what significance today’s decisions will have in two years’ time.”