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At first, many thought the shutdowns would last for a few months. But a year later, millions of workers are still working remotely.
The pandemic has forced much of the global workforce to go through remote work experience on a scale never seen before – and a lot has changed in the past 12 months.
The line between our work and our personal life has blurred. Working at the kitchen table has become mainstream, and for parents juggling virtual school while trying to meet deadlines has become a daily challenge.
Employers have also been forced to become more agile. They had to ease restrictions on the workplaces of employees, equip them with the necessary tools and support them both professionally and personally.
Now that more and more people are getting vaccinated and children are going back to school, things seem like they can get back to ‘normal’, but the workplace as we know it can be changed forever.
And, of course, some companies will want everyone to come back.
Regardless of the approach taken, workers and employers can expect to run into a few hurdles as they navigate the next phase of this great work experience.
“Many companies were successful in working remotely in 2020, largely because everyone else was doing it – there was no inherent preference for office workers or stigma against remote workers,” said Andrew Hewitt, senior analyst at market research firm Forrester. “The hybrid is going to make dealing with that difference more difficult.”
The initial shock
On the Yelp business review site, IT had to scramble to find nearly 3,000 laptops for workers, mainly salespeople, when he walked away in March.
“We always had spare laptops, but not 3,000,” said Carolyn Patterson, director of human resources.
Artificial intelligence software company Coveo emptied its offices in early March 2020. With more than 600 employees around the world, employees were used to working in different time zones and locations. Yet collaboration and in-person gatherings are an important part of the company’s culture.
“We were a company that used to come together, fly people all over the world… to come together. People need to interact in person,” said CEO Louis Tetu.
From the start, the company went out of its way to ensure that workers were well-equipped in their home offices by allowing for expenses such as technological equipment and noise-canceling headphones, as well as subsidies for broadband Internet. And it was not cheap.
“It meant we were going to give you the best chair, the best screen… it cost us seven figures overnight,” Tetu said.
The cost, he said, was worth it. “You can’t build a great business if your people aren’t doing well.”
But it wasn’t fair understand the logistics of working from home that challenged employers and their workers at the start of the pandemic. There was also the mental and emotional toll it took.
“We recognized that our employees came to us to guide us through everything: the pandemic, how they were living, wanting to know what was safe and what was not,” said the executive vice president and chief resources officer. Cisco Human Resources, Policy and Objectives Manager, Fran Katsoudas. “It became very natural for us to have meetings where we had medical and mental health practitioners and business strategy discussions, all in the same meeting.
To help employees cope with the changes and uncertainties of the pandemic, some companies have improved their services, offer things like free counseling, childcare and office allowances, and increased days off.
But with regard to the workforce after the pandemic, remote working will no longer be seen as a particular advantage.
“It’s no longer: ‘Do you offer remote work?’ But give yourself enough organization support so that I can be as successful as the people who work in the office? Hewitt said.
He expects about 60% of companies to offer a hybrid working model, while 30% of companies will be back in the office and 10% will be entirely remote.
Now here’s the hardest part
Despite the challenges, Hewitt says the past year has been easy for what will follow.
“We played remote work in easy mode. We all did the same, everyone had equal access to information and promotions,” Hewitt said. “It will become more difficult in 2021 with the hybrid.”
Inequalities between remote workers and office workers can become an issue among a hybrid workforce. Office workers have more one-on-one time with the boss, which can lead to better relationships, increased access to information, and high-level assignments.
“There was the stigma [before the pandemic], that remote workers were less productive and less career oriented, ”Hewitt said.
Training managers on how to also integrate remote and in-person workers into meetings and decision-making, as well as how they communicate, is a critical step in equalizing the workforce.
At Yelp, the majority of employees worked in company offices before the pandemic. The company now offers most employees the choice of continuing to work remotely or coming to the office a few days a week.
“We’re going to be very careful that managers don’t change the pattern that you have to come to the office for an important meeting, because that’s not possible if people leave,” Patterson said.
Workers who move to areas where the cost of labor is significantly higher or lower may have their wages adjusted.
The company has created a three-tier system to manage changes in compensation for moving workers.
“If you go from a Level 1 location to a Level 3 location, you will get a reduced salary, but we still want to be competitive,” Patterson said.
Coveo also plans to give employees the flexibility to choose their workplace, but it has there is no plan to require everyone to be 100% remote.
“It’s very dehumanizing,” Tetu said of the companies that have gone totally away and are ditching their offices. “I think Slack and Zoom are great, but there is no equal in bringing people together and promoting a common culture.”
He looks forward to the day when he can safely reunite his team.
“We are going to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on plane tickets to bring everyone together. There is no doubt. There are huge gains and benefits in terms of cohesion.”
As things start to return to normal and services like daycare reopen on a regular basis, employers will likely become more stringent with their remote work requirements, according to Hewitt. This could mean requiring the employee to have on-call service in place during working hours or by standardizing a time zone in which everyone works.
“The other thing that happens with ‘work anywhere’ is tax laws,” Hewitt said. “It can get tricky and complex.”
Shrinkage Office
Businesses will also likely need less office space as more employees will start working remotely.
Tetu expects her business to use about 70% of the square footage it made before the pandemic.
To meet the needs of a hybrid workforce, office design will also likely be different..
Not all workers will need a designated office. Collaboration spaces will likely become a higher priority so that more team-oriented work can happen in the office, while individual work will be done at home.
Yelp is also considering reducing the size of its offices, according to Patterson.
“As our leases come in, we’ll start to reduce our footprint,” she said, adding that Yelp’s office spaces could be redesigned to include fewer offices and focus more on collaboration.
Even though more and more people are getting vaccinated, experts warn that it will take time to return to a sense of normalcy in to work.
“There’s going to be a long line here, there’s no doubt about it,” Tetu said. “There is a lasting psychological impact. Life has been shaken up a bit, and it has multiple ramifications. “
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