Thought piece: Why the ‘new normal’ shouldn’t ignore the importance of the office

There have been a number of positives from having to implement a blanket ‘Working from Home’ policy this year and businesses can no longer afford to hide behind poor infrastructure or claims of reduced productivity when it comes to remote working.

However, as Leadership teams look to create policy around where people work as part of the ‘New Normal’, it’s imperative that they take into consideration the importance of the office, and the relationships that are built within them, for long term innovation.

Whilst its likely that individuals, able to adapt their workspace environments, benefit from the lack of commute and have less immediate distractions, see their individual productivity increase – how many teams can honestly say they have collectively seen the same benefits?

As set out by the Agile Penny Game, teams are considerably more efficient when working together across tasks, rather than focusing exclusively on their own individual work. Spontaneous catch ups, quick fire discussion and over the desk chats have been replaced with scheduled Zoom meetings and all the joys of people muting themselves rather than participating and continuous connection issues.

This lockdown has taught me how much of my energy and motivation I get from being in the office. Five-minute chats about Love Island whilst making a coffee, up to ‘accidentally’ bumping into a senior consultant I want to confirm a meeting with, all play a part in being able to work at my highest capacity.

What might seem like frivolous or unnecessary interactions, are key to networking within a company. This in turn brokers connections between departments or teams and increases cognitive capacity and reduces groupthink. Siloed working without any wider interaction may get to a solution faster but is more likely to be heavily biased and less innovative in the long term.

The importance of weak ties is regularly stated as key to gaining influence and diversity within your networks, but its also a key player in developing a feeling of belonging, creating company culture and more widely, employee happiness. And unfortunately, no amount of Zoom calls, Slack channels and WhatsApp groups are going to be able to replicate that.

Whilst I would never undermine the importance of employee safety whilst we are still globally tackling COVID-19, for companies to overcome the pressures and challenges we will collectively face in the wake of the pandemic and the off-set of the next recession, I implore decision makers to consider the importance of a range of settings for their workforce.

Instead of looking at an either/or situation, ask yourselves the question; ‘How can we enable a workforce based both remotely and onsite to efficiently and effectively work together’ and use this opportunity to empower your workforce to work in the most effective way for them.