Posted on 12/18/2023 4:45:08 AM PST by bert
In post-pandemic times, many employers and companies are continuing to mandate a return to the office for their workers — and some employees are responding with a particular form of pushback.
First, there was the trend "quiet quitting," in which workers did the bare minimum on the job just to get by — and now, say workplace leaders and experts, there’s "coffee badging," another form of employee protest.
What is ‘coffee badging’? As some employees are being called back to the office, many are subtly protesting by returning to the office for as little time as possible, Frank Weishaupt, CEO of Owl Labs in Boston, told FOX Business.
"Coffee badging is when employees show up to the office for enough time to have a cup of coffee, show their face and get a ‘badge swipe' — then go home to do the rest of their work," said Weishaupt.
His firm, Owl Labs, which makes 360° video conferencing devices, did a deep dive into the trend's data.
"Our 2023 State of Hybrid Work report found that only about 1 in 5 workers (22%) want to be in the office full time, with 37% wanting hybrid work options and 41% preferring to be fully remote," said Weishaupt.
More than half (58%) of hybrid workers are "coffee badging," a study found.
Further, he said the Owl Labs study found that more than half (58%) of hybrid workers are "coffee badging," while another 8% said they haven't done it yet but would like to try it.
How are workers getting away with ‘coffee badging’? People at all levels of companies and organizations are busy with their own jobs, so they don’t have time to keep tabs on everyone else’s whereabouts, said Weishaupt.
"If a coffee badger doesn’t have any in-person meetings or a desk near the boss, the person might not be missed," he said.
"Our data shows that about two-thirds of managers (64%) have ‘coffee badged’ themselves, with another 6% who want to try it," he also said.
"Less than a third of managers (30%) want to go to the office for the full day."
Why is the trend emerging now? Niki Jorgensen, managing director of client implementation with Insperity in Denver, told FOX Business that several months ago, coffee badging began making news as the latest work trend.
"Coffee badging is simply the latest example of the challenges businesses are facing with transitioning employees back to the office after the pandemic," she said.
How can firms address this? It's important for each business to do its own research into coffee badging, Jorgensen suggested.
"There is no need to panic over coffee banging, yet if a business finds most of its employees are coffee badging, that could reflect the need to reevaluate their organization's culture and work-from-home policies," she told FOX Business.
Often, but not always, coffee badging is a reflection of employee dissatisfaction with an organization’s culture or hybrid policies, said Jorgensen.
"Coffee badging can seem disrespectful or even insubordinate to business leaders who expect their employees to spend a full day in the office," she said.
Yet "it's important to understand that the motivations for coffee badging are rarely ill-intentioned," she clarified.
Three fixes to consider Company managers may want to focus on a few strategies to halt coffee badging among employees, Jorgensen said.
Implement flex hours. "To encourage employees to spend more time at the office, consider flex hours so they can come in an hour earlier or later," she said. Encourage employees to get together. Employees want to socialize with one another, said Jorgensen. Given this, "leaders can create opportunities for employees to socialize by planning events over lunch or immediately after hours," she said. Embrace open communication. Coffee badging can be a symptom of overworked, burned out and disengaged employees, Jorgensen suggested. "To combat it, invite employees to speak up about their experience in the workplace and share solutions to help them balance their work and personal lives more easily," she said.
"When workers only come into the office briefly and then leave, they are not spending as much time interacting face to face," she told FOX Business.
"Over time, this can undermine relationship-building and reduce collaboration."
Emily Ballesteros, founder of Burnout Management, LLC, in Seattle and author of the upcoming book, "The Cure for Burnout: How to Find Balance and Reclaim Your Life" (Feb. 2024), told FOX Business that a downside to the coffee badging trend is that it creates unpredictability that can impact others.
"Where there is unrest, there is usually a need to be met."
"Trying to schedule meetings when you're unsure of who is virtual or in-person; planning around commutes to and from the office; needing clarification on whether a meeting is virtual or in-person, etc. — all of this adds a bit more unpredictability to the workday that can cause frustration," Ballesteros said.
To reduce unpredictability, many companies are introducing hybrid schedules.
"They have seen on surveys that their employees would like the flexibility to work from home sometimes," she said.
"So rather than have constant flux and unpredictability around who is where, they create a schedule that meets people in the middle, such as saying that everyone works from home Monday and Friday and everyone is in the office Tuesday-Thursday," noted Ballesteros.
"Where there is unrest, there is usually a need to be met."
If they aren’t getting their jobs done, fire them. If the company is afraid getting sued for firing them, downsize or eliminate their job, hire someone new under a different job title.
I estimate that 80% of work from home employees are doing the absolute minimum.
“The fellow who had moderate exposure got hired on my recommendation, and he is working out great, but we just got lucky.”
It was your knowledge and Wisdom that drove the decision. IT organizations are losing that at a rapid pace.
Hah!! Oh that is rich!!
I’ve seen projects where it’s comparable to building a tall building. You get 8 stories built, and the users request a new floor between floors 4 and 5. And they really need a basement.
Sort of got them by the short hairs. My first response is, FIRE THEM, but if they do that, they won’t have any employees. All just a symptom of the ungodly lack of ethics, work and otherwise. Whoever thought things like this would ever be a thing? Our society is crumbling under the weight of sin; and it IS sin.
My son was a teacher and assistant administrator at a private school. When the owner moved the school to 50 miles away from his home, he told her that he would have to quit or work from home 3 days a week, she readily agreed. He did all of her IT work, plus administration plus taught a few classes on the 2 days he drove into school. The school was in the Chicago area, and the commute was 2 hours one way, so he just couldn’t go in 5 days a week. It worked out good for him and the school.
That goes without saying, I would think.
I have hobbies, friends, and two sons who live out of state that I'd like to see a whole lot more than "working" as much as I do. :-)
It's time to enjoy the fruits of my labors and live my best life.
I worked at a large corporation for over thirty years and had been accustomed to having my own office for much of that time.
Then it was determined that a new department office building was needed, and the production manager thought it would be just a swell plan to set it up with an ‘open office’. To “facilitate collaboration”, he said.
It drove me crazy. After the morning planning meeting a certain engineer would regularly stop by my neighbor’s cube to talk about fly fishing. He had one of those voices that carries like a foghorn, and would sit nearby to talk for 30-45 minutes. Damned...near...every...day.
The aisleway past my desk turned out to be a thoroughfare for people coming and going from the building. It was a relief to retire, although I still miss interacting with some of my old coworkers.
I sit and watch my wife work from home every day. She is as writer for a healthcare system.
Here work product is measured, literally, by the subject and word count. Her productivity has increased about 10-15% throughout the pandemic. And, during the pandemic her projects increased to high levels. The output hasn’t slowed down.
Her department head actually allows her whole team to work from home now. They were able to free up workspace and expand coverage. She used to work for a single hospital. Now she able to work for two…plus some regional staff.
Office work was subject to lots of “drop in” stuff. Lots of time wasted going from one building to the next.
As someone who used to run big call centers I was very aware of remote users decades ago. I never thought you could get measurable performance improvement without the “human” touch. I was wrong.
I think it depends on the tasks, the people, and the metrics. She has a lot more “quick touch” meetings with her supervisor than she ever had before. There are three daily 10 minute review-the-day meetings with her various teams.
But she also gets to walk the dog and do laundry during the day. If she had to keep going into the office every day, she would have been hankering to retire two years ago. And we cannot have that…she would spend her time thinking about what I should be doing.
#23 The company I worked at when all were working from home sent out a email telling people not to start early and stay longer then their shift... some I imagined loved it while others hated that they could not finish some work they had to do.
The thing I think is interesting is the change in most corporate policies for working remote. I have been 100% remote for over 6 years now. The company resisted it for a long time, but now has come to the conclusion that where you are really doesn’t matter as long as the work is done. They moved offices about 3 years ago, and I don’t even know the address. I couldn’t locate my badge at this point.
If you’re self-motivated it is a great way to work.
Some folks are good candidates for working remotely, others aren't. The key is you have to be self-motivated to get everything done. Many folks who can't work from home were pretty useless in the office as well.
-——self-motivated——
There you have it. The key to the success of a home office
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