December 21, 2021
This looming transition is not as simple as it seems, and the current skills shortage is only raising the stakes. Don’t offer enough flexibility and you’ll increasingly struggle to attract or retain talent. Offer too much and there’s a view you’ll erode your culture and competitive edge.
As we transition to living with COVID in the community this year it is inevitable businesses will need to migrate back to office based working, or at least a hybrid office / home model. However, we’ve learnt from both jobseekers and employers that this looming transition is not as simple as it seems. It represents both opportunities and risks depending on how organisations embrace the move, yet a lot of uncertainty still remains.
The current skills shortage is only raising the stakes. Don’t offer enough and you’ll increasingly struggle to attract or retain talent. Offer too much and there’s a view you’ll erode your culture and competitive edge.
Here’s a few things to consider based on our recent conversations and observations.
Many businesses adapted well to onboarding staff remotely. However, a big part of any new starter’s induction is the assimilation into company’s culture and creating the connection with colleagues and the business that helps form their ‘psychological bond’ with their new employer.
Consider a social gathering or welcome event, and 1:1s with stakeholders to ensure they don’t just know the role but are feeling part of the business too, even if this has been done online already. There’s no substitute for in-person once back.
There is a lot of debate about how and when to offer new starters the flexibility on offer to other staff. In some cases, new recruits may already have commitments out of work requiring a degree of flexibility from the outset. However, if this isn’t the case, forcing a recruit to wait months (as some do) seems not only too long, but also the wrong measure.
Instead, we recommend breaking down the core elements of their role and build towards ‘full’ flexibility (as per your policy) based on their mastery of each. This can help steer your catch ups and help determine who else in the office can give exposure to best practice in each area. We’ve noticed a flawed perception that a team leader needs to be present in the office with their newbie. In many cases letting a new starter fend for themselves for a day is actually healthy for both parties. It teaches the employee to be self-sufficient and allows the team leader to preserve their own flexible working. Provided the induction has some structure and coaching sessions are regular and effective there is no reason why someone new can’t progress to full flexibility within weeks at most.
There are many employees mentally limping to the Christmas break, expecting to recharge in their short time off. However, for some, the stress of Christmas and the extraordinary cognitive load caused by having to reset so many of life’s routines recently means they will return less refreshed than they’d like. We shouldn’t underestimate the impact of having to unlearn these remote working routines, coupled with the anxiety of returning to an office full of people when the media continues to highlight emerging COVID risks. Consider a short transitional period to readjust to office-based work and watch out for individuals struggling in January.
Even if it seemed effective pre lockdown now’s the perfect time to reconsider how perceptions and habits have changed after 107 days at home, and how your policy could evolve too. While many ‘lockdown’ methods weren’t sustainable they may have pushed out the boundaries of what is.
Some hiring managers have frustratingly told us they “just want their team back in the office more”, in some cases more often than previously mandated. This is because they’re feeling isolated as a leader or worried about the team becoming disconnected from each other. This is totally understandable given recent employment surveys out of the USA are showing the “Great Resignation” is being fuelled in part by the erosion of emotional connection with their employer stemming from long periods working remotely. However, be careful of a knee jerk reaction as this could easily lead to higher attrition too.
Make sure to set a minimum expectation not a new set of rigid rules. Replacing the traditional (and officially outdated) expectation of 9-5 Mon-Fri with a new set of rules is not flexible. The most popular minimum timeframe for non-front line staff seems to be either 2 or 3 days in the office, with some degree of glide time each day.
Your minimum office times should be driven by:
Customers: What is the limit to flexibility set by customer expectations?
Operating rhythm: Every company has one, either deliberate or organic. It is the processes, behaviours, meetings, reporting, communications, and deadlines etc that creates your operational cadence. Which aspects work online? Which don’t? Which can you adjust around flexible working and which cannot due to external factors? Which are you holding onto out of habit alone?
Collaboration and camaraderie: What’s the minimum time frame to achieve this? How can we create richer cross-team interaction in more limited time? Can you stagger office times across a team or teams yet create deliberate convergence points when everyone comes together at the same time to collaborate?
On the flip side, they shouldn’t be driven by:
A lack of trust: If you don’t trust a team member to work remotely by now you never will. Either they shouldn’t be in your team or you haven’t provided the coaching and/or expectations necessary to be productive. The younger of our work force also see flexibility as a privilege rather than right, yet they expect trust should be extended upfront (and revoked if abused), not earned over time as generation X and beyond were conditioned. If someone is delivering to your expectations what’s the problem? If they are not then it’s reasonable to have a constructive conversation explaining the gap and the need to spend more time with you (in the office) to support their development in those areas.
Technology: If the role can be undertaken remotely but your organization doesn’t have the technology to do so sustainably then you will lose staff.
Gut feel or a need to over compensate after the lockdown: Find ways to better maximise what time you do have together rather than simply create a new arbitrary expectation. Your staff will judge you by the logic and commercial thinking behind your flexibility decision not necessarily the decision itself.
Whether it be congestion, current or future pandemics, climate change, or something else, we must continue to challenge our mindset and expectations regarding how, when and where our workforce engage with their role and evolve our HR polices accordingly.
It may be comforting to know that very few leaders we speak to have the answers to flexible working, and of course you can’t keep everyone happy all the time. If you’d like to compare notes with our own approach at Cultivate or have us put you in touch with organisations who have initiated what you’re considering please reach out. We’d love to help where we can.
