Interesting article by @kieran_howells at Executive Grapevine.
It is deeply worrying that a significant number of leaders still prefer their teams back in the office asap. We have witnessed this with a couple of travel companies insisting their teams are in the office, despite the government rules (not guidelines) to work from home. They are putting their employees at great risk and indeed their families. This can lead to toxic culture. But equally, when leaders reluctantly allow employees to work from home, but constantly keep a sneaky eye on its employees also leads to this. They send never-ending messages and call outside of working hours to ensure the employees are ‘always on’.
Having said this, hopefully the majority of our client base see the benefit of remote working from both an employer and employee perspective. Operational costs such as utilities, cleaning and supply costs reduced, and for some, the increase in worker wellbeing and productivity has been enough to downsize or even do away with the office altogether.
Here are 5 of the key signs to see if your culture has suffered: if the firewall stops you reading the article it only takes a minute to sign up for this content. It's worth it.
Even the most fervent of leaders must have accepted now that, at least for the foreseeable future, the majority of the workforce will remain remote. The concept of a digitally-connected workforce is nothing new – people have been ‘telecommuting’, as it was once known, for decades. However even before the pandemic struck, just 30% of the global population of professionals operated remotely full time – a number that drops down to just 18% when reviewing executives and heads of function. However, with the pandemic continuing to disrupt the world, and Government legislation now stating that people are advised to work remotely wherever possible – plus, we might add, the fact that a massive 99% of workers would actively opt for remote working for at least some of the time, according to Buffer data – that 30% has risen to unprecedented levels.
