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Many businesses expected an employee rush back into the workplace once the Covid-19 vaccine was rolled out. Instead, a significant number of workers decided they liked their new work-from-home situation and pushed to keep their more flexible scenario.
The companies and organizations that adapt to this need will be the ones to succeed. They’ll recruit and retain better talent and cut attrition rates.
Over the past few months, new studies have found that productivity actually increases when employees work from home. In a recent study conducted by Stanford, 16,000 workers were tracked over 9 months while working remotely. The study showed that working from home increased productivity by 13%. This significant increase was attributed to a quieter workspace, more convenient workday and working more overall because of less breaks and fewer sick days.
The same study reported that attrition was cut by 50% and employees reported increased work satisfaction. A different study by talent recruiter company ConnectSolutions, reported that 77% of employees who work remotely, even just a few times a month, show increased productivity, with 30% finishing more work in less time.
But what if you work in an industry where working from home isn’t an option? For businesses in the hospitality industry, adapting is a necessity or you risk losing your staff. Management in hotels and restaurants are experiencing this firsthand. People are searching for life balance and if their job doesn’t provide it, they’re leaving.
A large “antiwork” forum on social media platform Reddit has grown more than 400% over the past year and now has more than 900,000 members. In the forum, people share their stories of frustration and, in many cases, their anecdotes about quitting an unfulfilling job or inflexible manager.
A bartender in New York City shared that their boss demanded they come to work on a Saturday for their ninth consecutive day of work. When they refused, the manager threatened to withhold company benefits. The bartender resigned immediately.
This is an excellent example of what not to do. If you want workers in the workplace, threatening them is not going to cut it. Instead, businesses need to adapt, whether it’s about letting employees work from home or giving them regular time off without any hassle.
What leaders and management are facing – and truly, what research has always shown – is that people don’t go to work just for money. Increasing pay or salary isn’t enough for many. There is a cut-off point which they just won’t work beyond. After the pandemic, it’s become clear that people are much more interested in life balance. Notice the words I used there: not work-life balance, but life balance. People realized over the past 20 months that work isn’t the biggest facet of their life, it’s merely just a part.
Leaders need to adapt to their changing employee needs, whether you’re a consulting firm with 100,000 full-time employees, a restaurant chain with shift workers or a small landscaping service with a small team of laborers. Here are some ways to start adapting to what your employees want and need.
Hybrid work needs to be an option – and executed thoughtfully.
Employees are open to hybrid work options and coming into the workplace, but after spending more than a year and a half working from home, they want some logic behind the decision. Demanding that workers be in the office a certain number of days a week, without any reasoning, isn’t going to resonate, and you risk employees leaving for a more flexible workplace.
Take a top-down approach and go team by team to decide hybrid schedules. If a specific team is extremely collaborative, perhaps they have to be in the office more than a team of individual contributors who rarely work together.
Leadership should focus less on control and more on culture.
For many years, leadership meant controlling where, when and how your employees work. It was more about accountability when, in fact, management in 2021 should be more about leading and inspiring the team.
In a New York Times interview with Nathan Schultz, a senior executive at education technology company Chegg, he shared that when his team first started working from home, he would constantly check up on his employees. But once he backed off and gave them autonomy, not only did productivity increase, his team would also complete projects ahead of deadline.
Leaders who see their team members as humans rather than subordinates will see greater loyalty and productivity.
Listening to your employees and treating them with respect and empathy during the “new normal” will help leaders find and keep the best talent for the long term. Adaptability in the workplace has never been more critical.
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