Posted on 08/03/2023 10:38:50 AM PDT by ShadowAce
We’re now finding out the damaging consequences of the mandated return to office. And it’s not a pretty picture. A trio of compelling reports—the Greenhouse Candidate Experience report, the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking (SHED), and Unispace’s Returning for Good report—collectively paint a stark picture of this brewing storm.
Unispace found that nearly half (42%) of companies with return-to-office mandates witnessed a higher level of employee attrition than they had anticipated. And almost a third (29%) of companies enforcing office returns are struggling with recruitment. In other words, employers knew the mandates would cause some attrition, but they weren’t ready for the serious problems that would result.
Meanwhile, a staggering 76% of employees stand ready to jump ship if their companies decide to pull the plug on flexible work schedules, according to the Greenhouse report. Moreover, employees from historically underrepresented groups are 22% more likely to consider other options if flexibility comes to an end.
In the SHED survey, the gravity of this situation becomes more evident. The survey equates the displeasure of shifting from a flexible work model to a traditional one to that of experiencing a 2% to 3% pay cut.
Flexible work policies have emerged as the ultimate edge in talent acquisition and retention. The Greenhouse, SHED, and Unispace reports, when viewed together, provide compelling evidence to back this assertion.
Greenhouse finds that 42% of candidates would outright reject roles that lack flexibility. In turn, the SHED survey affirms that employees who work from home a few days a week greatly treasure the arrangement.
The Greenhouse report has ranked employees’ priorities as:
In other words, excluding career-centric factors such as pay, security, and promotion, flexible work ranks first in employees’ priorities.
Interestingly, Unispace throws another factor into the mix: choice. According to its report, overall, the top feelings employees revealed they felt toward the office were happy (31%), motivated (30%), and excited (27%). However, all three of these feelings decrease for those with mandated office returns (27%, 26%, and 22%, respectively). In other words, staff members were more open to returning to the office if it was out of choice, rather than forced.
Recently, I was contacted by a regional insurance company with a workforce of around 2,000 employees. The company enforced a return-to-office policy, causing waves of unrest. It soon became evident that its attrition rates were climbing steadily. In line with the Greenhouse report’s findings, most employees would actively seek a new job if flexible work policies were retracted. The underrepresented groups were even more prone to leave, making the situation more daunting.
At that point, the company called me to help as a hybrid work expert who the New York Times has called “the office whisperer.” We worked on adapting the return-to-office plan, switching it from a top-down mandate to a team-driven approach, and focusing on welcoming staff to the office for the sake of collaboration and mentoring. As a result, the company’s attrition rates dropped and the feelings of employees toward the office improved, in line with what the Unispace report suggests.
In another case, a large financial services company began noticing employee turnover despite offering competitive salaries and growth opportunities. Upon running an internal survey, managers realized that aside from better compensation and career advancement opportunities, employees were seeking better flexible work policies. This aligned with the Greenhouse and SHED findings, which ranked flexible work policies as a crucial factor influencing job changes. After consulting with me, they adjusted their policies to be more competitive in offering flexibility.
A late-stage SaaS startup decided to embrace this wave of change. The company worked with me to introduce flexible work policies, and the result was almost immediate: Managers noticed a sharp decrease in employee turnover and an uptick in job applications. Their story echoes the collective message from all three reports: Companies must adapt to flexible work policies or risk being outcompeted by other employers.
As we navigate these shifting landscapes of work, we cannot ignore the human elements at play. Like unseen puppeteers, cognitive biases subtly shape our decisions and perceptions. In the context of flexibility and retention, two cognitive biases come into sharp focus: the status quo bias and anchoring bias.
Imagine a thriving tech startup, successfully operating in a hybrid model during the pandemic. As the world normalized, leadership decided to return to pre-pandemic, in-person work arrangements. However, they faced resistance and an unexpected swell of turnover.
This situation illustrates the potent influence of the status quo bias. This bias, deeply entrenched in our human psyche, inclines us toward maintaining current states or resisting change. Employees, having tasted the fruits of flexible work, felt averse to relinquishing these newfound freedoms.
Consider a large financial institution that enforced a full return to office after the pandemic. Many employees, initially attracted by the brand and pay scale, felt disgruntled. The crux of the problem lies in the anchoring bias, which leads us to heavily rely on the first piece of information offered (the anchor) when making decisions.
When initially joining the company, the employees were primarily concerned with compensation and job security. Once within the fold, the pandemic caused them to shift their focus to work-life balance and flexibility, as confirmed by both the Greenhouse and SHED reports. Unfortunately, the rigid return-to-office policy made these new anchors seem less attainable, resulting in dissatisfaction and an increased propensity to leave.
As we steer our ships through these tumultuous waters, understanding cognitive biases can help illuminate our path. Recognizing and accounting for the status quo and anchoring biases can enable us to create a workplace that not only attracts but also retains its employees in the new age of flexibility. After all, success in the world of business is as much about understanding people as it is about numbers and strategy.
“...and it would be as if the employer reneged on an agreement.”
And in some cases they did. My son’s wife accepted a job in 2022 with a large employer upon the express representation that she could work remotely. They then sold their house in an urban cesspool and brought a place in a conservative bubble about 1.5 hours away. The employer has recently told all employees to return to the office by September 1 or they will be terminated. She now works for another company.
“No one should give a crap about employees feelings. It’s like crying in baseball. Ridiculous”.
That’s not an intelligent thing to say.
Firing is the easy part.
Hiring folks who can actually do the job is the hard part.
Managers who can’t figure that out need to polish their “will work for food” signs for the street-corner.
In other words, excluding career-centric factors such as pay, security, and promotion, flexible work ranks first in employees’ priorities.
Liberal math........................
Too lazy as in too lazy to travel several thousand miles to get to the office?
We've hired people who live in different states. There is no "return to the office" for them.
If you discover that you can do without these people, then do so.................
It's no longer what it was like for you in the 1980s.
We have better oversight online than we ever had in the office. I can see just how long each task was dragged along before being completed, something we could never do with folks swishing paper and "ideas" around in the office.
No offense to your daughter in law but it was easy to see that coming.
Even if she was a good employee, I'm sure she was, you have too many other employees taking advantage of WFH arrangement so productivity is way down compared to what it was before when everyone worked in the office.
I had a peer in my industry tell me how great the "three days a week" model works for her organization. Everyone is in the office Tuesday through Thursday, and works from home on Mondays and Friday.
She works for a government agency, so she's obviously completely in the dark about the biggest flaw in that arrangement. Bringing people into the office 3/5ths of the time only makes sense financially if you can reduce your office footprint by 40% and schedule your staff to work in shared arrangements. If everyone is coming to the office on the same three days, then the employer has to keep 100% of its office space even though it isn't being used 40% of the time during weekday business hours.
There is no doubt that many, if not most, employees would do an honest day’s work. Unfortunately, a large chunk of employees will not pull their weight.
“the slackers always found a way to loaf in the office anyway, so this way we don’t have to see them loaf.”
You forgot the best part—when you are not in the office you do not need to listen to them loaf—many are often noisy and disruptive while they get on the phone with all their girlfriends to discuss their plans to raise bond for their “good boy” who is in jail—yet again.
“It might work if you’re a small company and you’re managing a bunch of Baby Boomers.”
I managed a remote staff of many different ages for 20 years for a Fortune 100 company. It’s a matter of hiring people with the right mindset for remote work and knowing how to manage them.
The same goes for young workers, who are now expected to "sacrifice" for jobs paying poverty-level wages that won't pay enough even to rent an apartment or buy a car. What for? If you can live at a level not much lower than working full-time by working part-time or off the books, why bother with a low-paying job with no possibility of advancement?
Conservatives are big on the stick, but the carrot is also needed to influence behavior. If you think you can force people to work or starve, they'll just vote for politicians to take from you and give to them. So be careful what you wish for.
It might work at the micro level but it doesn't mean it will work at the macro level at this time right now for all the employees and employers.
Ever tried to install equipment remotely?
Do hardware repairs remotely?
Deliver a tractor trailer load to a warehouse remotely?
Lay asphalt remotely?
Some jobs still require the presence of a warm body.
Proper BS. One, it's a Scamdemic, not a pandemic.
Two, employees didn't shift their focus to work-life balance instead of compensation and job security. Many found out they had better compensation and more job security when they could offer their expertise to companies situated farther away from the typical Democrat urban dump.
It might work in certain circumstances. Yours is a great example of that.
As commercial real estate goes south.
Big liberal run cities are going to have big revenue declines in property taxes.
Welcome to reality.
5.56mm
Lazy? Certainly not the ones I deal with, and calling any of them lazy ignores the reality that so many of them will never "return to the office" because they live several states away.
Our remote workers are far, far better than our locals. It's not even close.
“how does a company train a new hire? How do they develop and mentor a new hire?”
Before I retired that was exactly what I did.
We spent one week in the local office where I gave “basic training” and showed them how to find information they needed. In most cases they were from elsewhere in the country so they had to fly into my area.
Then both of us went home.
The next few weeks they had lots of questions which I handled with daily phone calls and lots of instant messaging.
As they got up to speed the phone calls and IMs were still there but less frequent.
After six months or so they were good to go.
Easy peasy.
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