Here’s What You Need to Make Your Hybrid Workplace Work
The modern workplace has been challenging the traditional working norms heavily in the past decade. From special benefits packages to flexible working arrangements and remote work. Modern organizations and employees are looking for something different in other 9-to-5 jobs.
The global workforce was already on its way to standardize remote work, work from home, as well as flexible working arrangements when the pandemic started. Back when we all thought this would only last a couple of weeks, working from home looked like something we could do forever. But, we’ve been working from home for a year now, and it’s starting to get old.
According to a recent Gallup survey, more than 50% of US workers are working remotely, with 23% expressing the desire to continue working remotely if given the opportunity. On the other hand, more companies are announcing that they will incorporate a hybrid working model once the pandemic restrictions are a thing of the past.
What is a Hybrid Workplace?
A hybrid workplace is neither a remote nor strictly office workplace - it’s a mix of both. Usually, companies in this position let their employees work a few days from home, while they need to come in for the rest of the week.
It depends on the company, but employees are usually working two days from home, and three days in the office. This type of work gives workers flexibility, providing them with a better work-life balance.
But, if you are planning on creating a hybrid workplace, you need to set yourself up for success, and we’ll show you how to do it.
Make Sure It’s What Your Employees Want
Before you make a big change like this one and make it mandatory, you need to make sure it’s what your employees want. We recommend that you either organize an anonymous survey so that workers can share their unfiltered opinion on working from home and hybrid working. Working from home is hard for some people because of roommates, families, kids, etc. Therefore, you can’t expect that everyone will be hyped about the opportunity.
Besides asking “Would you prefer working from home”, you should also give some space for open-ended questions to better understand why your employees are for or against the proposed working arrangements.
If not everyone prefers the hybrid approach, try to accommodate people to the best of your ability, without affecting the daily work.
Prepare the Necessary Tools
During the pandemic you probably started using some new tools for communication, project management, and collaboration - all of these will be handy if you decide to move to the hybrid working model.
Besides these, we recommend that you invest in good remote employee monitoring software. It will make keeping track of your team’s attendance and productivity way easier. You can even use the data to compare how productivity changes when employees are working from home and the office.
It’s a simple solution that will help you with the transition to a hybrid workplace, and it will also help you understand if you made the right choice.
Conclusion
Contrary to the popular belief - not everyone will be happy with the hybrid working arrangement. Moreover, this arrangement won’t be a good fit for every company. So, talk with your employees, acquire the tools you need, and revisit the strategy after a while to make sure you’re getting what you expected.
