Following up on our previous post ‘How Companies Manage Hundreds of Employees Remotely‘, this additional post ‘Tech will return to work, but habits will be changed forever‘ provides more perspective on the changes coming up for more traditional technology companies (those with large offices!).
Because in the next few months it will not be possible to have more than 25% of the people normally present in offices (from distanciation to limits in elevator capacity for high rises), many companies will be forced to work remotely for most of the time, with limited office presence.
In reality as I have heard around me and confirmed in the post, productivity has increased by working remotely for many people (provided there are limited domestic disturbances and limited impact of children care). One of the elements is the time gained by avoiding commuting.
On the other side, the working rhythm is tough with many people finding that the long days on video meeting take a toll on their well-being. The lack of informal relationship may also not be easy to bear on the longer term and may even create inefficiencies, because relying only on formal conversations and events is not sufficient in most companies and processes.
“The era of trophy-like corporate headquarters such as the Salesforce tower (1.6m sqft over 61 floors in downtown SF) may be over.”
It also seems that many people are now considering moving to the countryside to work remotely and maybe only attend the office a couple of days a week. This shift it is confirmed beyond the current intentions may well be very significant in reshaping our communities. It actually runs contrary to the tendency of relocation to city centers that prevailed in the past few years.
Interesting trends are shaping up. I am quite convinced that those are just trends of the Collaborative Age that are getting accelerated by the current crisis. For sure, for white collars, the era of the nomadic remote worker has just become much closer.
