What is the real impact of Working from home?
I love making my office feel beautiful
I have wanted to write on this topic for awhile now. As a person who has worked in the Digital & Tech industries for a long time, I am sure people would assume I am team WFH forever. If so, this post may surprise you after all.
I am of the opinion that everything needs context. There is no blanket statement that covers the ins and outs of the situation, for such a complex matter as where is a workforce most productive, motivated, at peace etc… There are many aspects that we need to consider when forming an opinion. If COVID showed us anything, it was that people are resilient, adaptable and can WFH with minimum impact on productivity at least for some time.
I have been reading so many posts on LinkedIn recently about WFH. People being really appalled by the idea of being in an office for 4-5 days a week. Stating all the issues this brings in terms of their set up, commute, daily tasks, childcare and so on. I read essays on how WFH is not impacting them, how they are more productive, how they do not need an office with bad coffee and chatter to distract them. How they hate the commute, the price of it and the packed tube/trains in commuter hours. I sympathise with that, however there are two sides of each coin. I have always thought about the other side of the argument. If you have chosen to live in London for example, let’s say somewhat central, so it is convenient for you to commute, enjoy the buzz of the city and the social aspect of the office. There are people who make career choices that align to their lifestyle. While recently my feeling is that people believe that a career needs to adapt to their preferred lifestyle. I do not hear much chat blaming the people WFH for the high monthly premium paid by people living in London, who cut down their commute because they have chosen to live close to the office. Yet, I have read endless posts about the train prices being high, the commute hours being long, and how it impacts their peaceful lifestyle etc…
This way of thinking begs the question, have people completely changed how they look at a job and its role in their lives? I am talking about the people who do not see any necessity to ever go to an office yet are full time employed in companies that have a physical presence. I think in today’s day an age every job should offer flexibility and not sway in either of the extremes. An office needs to have a purpose, going there should have a purpose and leaders should not bring people back just because they mistrust them.
In my opinion creativity, collaboration and output does suffer via a truly remote workforce, who never come together. Below I explore the aspects that I believe are fundamental drivers of human nature and business impact.
The corporate impact of WFH:
When you have a weird colour matching fashion day
First of all, everything in life is about balance. Prior to COVID we had almost no concept of work/life balance and many companies thought of WFH as you taking days off unofficially. There was very little trust or flexibility across so many places. When COVID came everyone was home. All of a sudden companies realised that, OK, this is not that bad, people are still working so we can trust them - cool.
As a leader that was heading a large team spread across the Globe during the pandemic I wanted to share my observations. First and foremost I wanted my team to be safe and comfortable during an unprecedented time. Everyone coped with the situation in a different way, so the focus during 2020-2021 was the teams morale, wellbeing and lastly productivity. They were amazing though, very few of them were not working hard, even harder than the office times. However, the novelty starter to wear off around 2022 and I saw a really interesting change. People started to explore the newly found freedom of WFH and not being in lockdown, and all of a sudden the people who were green on slack started to go away and then offline. When I messaged some of them, I would get a response after several hours. So the tables have turned. Now that the team knew they were trusted, that enough time had passed, they slowly started to push the boundary to see at what point there will be feedback. As a company we had started to implement voluntary 2 days in the office. Very few people came of course. I started going to the office and using it as an observation practice to see what happens - call it my little workplace experiment. I had a good relationship with my team, and soon it was blatantly apparent that they were now utilising all hours of the day to run errands, drop off/pick ups, appointments, just chilling out and so on. Trust me, I am not the person who will tell anyone off because they had to run an errand and then did their work. I believe we are all adults. However, when the boundary gets pushed to an extreme i.e everyone takes for granted that at any hour of the day, they can do whatever they want. Ultimately, they do not have true commitment to their work responsibilities, deadlines start slipping and results start lacking - then, I think we do have a problem. It is only natural that a human being gravitates towards an easier and less stressful day. The challenge comes that the desire for leisure is much stronger than our discipline a lot of the times. To compare WFH ethics and slipping, is similar to us getting that extra snack, when we know we should not. The desire for pleasure is stronger than the discipline it takes to achieve an outcome (in the snacking example - health, in the work example - a project deadline).
Afternoon tea parties in the office, it does not need to be pizza guys, I swear there are other options to make it good
This is when the line needs to be drawn between flexibility and work ethics. At the end of the day, we are paid by the companies we work for to deliver a certain service (outcome) between certain hours of the day. If you do not have constraints for hours in the day - great for you, then please feel free to work between midnight and 3 am. I am all for flexibility but not at the expense of output. A lot of people will probably jump at this saying - my productivity is not impacted. Maybe. Maybe you are one of those people that are super disciplined but there are a lot more of the people, who will push the boundaries of ‘flexibility’ beyond the acceptable.
The impact on Leadership:
The next aspect of WFH I want to look at is leadership. Once you have entered the leadership realm, you are not only responsible for your own deliverables, motivation and wellbeing but you are also a pillar for the business you work for, accountable for a team and a business function (or multiple). To become a successful leader, there is the aspect of skill and being extremely good at what you do. But of course there is the equally important aspects of relationship building and influencing outcomes. I stay on the side that in order to be a successful leader you need to be able to engage with people, in order to do that you need to meet them face to face. Not every day but not once a month either. It may not be what you want to hear but it is difficult to grow in your career while you WFH. Especially in a tough job market where everything is driven by personal connection, networking and just being in the right place. The small interactions that occur while you are in a common space with the people you need to engage cannot happen via a screen. Potentially, if you have been with a company for awhile or you have an already established connection with your decision makers this model can work but otherwise, I would deem it a highly unlikely option for growth.
Workshops I used to do across the globe before COVID, together with my team, teaching everyone how to photograph their trips and create content
Some of the greatest projects I have worked on have been born out of random chats while having lunch, or just catching up in a meeting with colleagues or team members. Say whatever you want but nothing beats creativity, energy and critical thinking than being able to bounce off of other people who are as enthusiastic about a subject as you are. You can pace around the room, order snacks, draw together, structure dataWhen we are communicating over whatever platform you choose to do your video calls, there is a barrier. We may not feel it fully but it is there. Studies show that people are much more tired from sitting on video calls than being in an all day workshop in person. Why? There is a simple psychological issue with video calls - the brain cannot see the full person in 3D. So the brain is working extra hard to pick up cues on mood, eye contact, vibe (threats), gesticulation and so on which comes natural when we are facing each other in a room. This is why our brains feel extra tired after a day of video calls.
The social and human impact of WFH:
Last but not least, there are the social aspects of a job. It may sound cliche but with a growing loneliness epidemic, some people do enjoy time in the office. Yes the water cooler chats, the dreaded pizza party, the pub on a Friday and so on. Not everyone has a loving family to go back to in the evening. For many years, jobs have given people the opportunity to socialise, meet new friends, partners and just be social during and after work. This is one of the reasons why I do not enjoy the polarity of the WFH conversation. People forget that their current POV is not everyone’s and there is a reason why certain social structured work and evolve the way they do. We are becoming more and more disconnected as a species, with the influx of digital technology, social media and overall decline in face to face interactivity. The office forces some of that to happen, the same way a school or a university does. We are growing generations of young people who are not equipped to deal with social interaction because they live online. Where it is easy to ghost an uncomfortable conversation, it is easy to pretend to be someone you are not, it is easy to boast skills that you do not possess and it is easy to shy away from developing your knowledge gaps. On the other spectrum we have people who are near or past retirement age, feeling isolated in a digital world, where they may struggle to adapt. The office provides an opportunity for generations to come together and learn from each other, support each other and ultimately be human with each other. We, as people, are social beings. We have minimised this primal need that we are all born with because we have a digital device that supposedly substitutes human interaction. However, all we are doing is creating a dysfunctional societal set up. We are the beginning of a curve that cares more about technology and efficiency than human interaction. I think it is everyone’s choice which side they would like to be on in the future.
One of my favourite creators Matilde, teaching everyone how to do a beautiful flatlay in Florence, Italy (our workshop venue for the day)
Can we do everything at home? No. Should we be going to the office every day? Also no. We need to be flexible, truly. Both in the job ads and in our attitude towards work. Work life flows in the same ways all other parts of our lives flow. It also has a ripple effect on so many layers of the society, economy, wellbeing and the ultimate flow of humanity. Hence why no extreme if ever a good side to be on. Call me old fashioned, but I do like to meet my team and colleagues face to face twice a week. I think it makes us better, more aligned, and it has also allowed me to have a few new friends.
