Before employers pressure employees to return to the workplace there are some matters they may wish to consider.
Are employees more productive?
- Released from the daily commute many employees arrive at work earlier, calmer and with more energy than previously.
- In a study of the 2020 lockdown, 80% of business leaders said their companies were at least as productive as they had been before. (Source Financial Times).
- Attempts by Yahoo, in 2013, to bring its remote workers back in to the office failed spectacularly – contributing to its downfall.
- Richard Branson is quoted as saying: “Give people the freedom of where to work & they will excel.”
But can improvements be sustained?
- In 1974 the economy produced as much on a three-day week as it did on a five day one. No-one expected that to be sustainable.
- Many of us love a crisis. So, we step up to the plate, “pull out the stops”. In time we risk burn-out.
- Tim Cook (Apple CEO) is reported as saying there are elements of organisational life that cannot be replicated in remote working.
- Many of the home working environments will not meet strict health and safety guidelines. These may have been overlooked in the crisis but will need to be addressed if permanent.
Implementing a return to the workplace
- Consult your employees. What suits one will not suit another. Different roles may have different requirements. The beauty of an SME is that you can often accommodate individuals without worrying about blanket policies or other political considerations.
- Consult the “contract of employment”. If resistance to your requirements is great you may need to fall back on the written terms of employment – which you will have, of course.
- Rely on those written contracts with caution. We might yet see “custom and practice” being flagged up as an argument for allowing remote working to continue. That will be a matter for the courts.
- Persuasion can motivate. Coercion will not and may have other consequences. But when the persuader is “the boss” the distinction is not always clear cut.
I’ve heard it said that 8 out of 10 decisions can be taken immediately. Returning to the workplace is not one of them.
Malcolm Martin FCIPD
Author Human Resource Practice
Blogs are for general guidance and are not an authoritative statement of the law