Suddenly, when you cut out that three-hour commute, you found time to go for that daily walk or run; you could drop the kids off at school, help them with their homework, and be available for family dinners. With greater control of our own time, it suddenly felt possible to do more.

Now as employers look to bring back their staff, they face the dilemma of how to encourage people back to the office given all the challenges associated with the pre-Covid workplace. There have been a variety of responses and approaches to the post-pandemic return to the workplace. Some organizations have opted for a return to pre-Covid working regimes, others are welcoming hybrid as the new norm, and others have decided to allow employees to work from home indefinitely and are even advertising it as a benefit to attract new talent.

The extended workplace:

Given all of this, it is not surprising many companies are reticent and asking: what is the new working model? At Woods Bagot we envision a new normal where the workplace plays a more active role in the communities of which they are part and where employers provide more of the perks that remote working has offered beleaguered staff. In this new normal we imagine a future where the workplace extends itself to do more for its local community and where the working environment works doubly and even triply to enhance the employee experience. We spoke to Woods Bagot’s Interior Workplace Leader, Amanda Stanaway, who is based in Australia where many of our clients and colleagues have navigated the tricky transition back to the workplace and have shared some of their timely insights from their own lived experiences.

04

Policy and Purpose: Intentionally laying the foundation for hybrid work

As many companies accept the new hybrid reality, it is incumbent upon employers to provide the appropriate technology infrastructure to support hybrid collaboration and improve the work experience for everyone. The responsibility sits with leadership to effectively orchestrate the hybrid workplace, which now includes two different modes of work: in-person and remote. In the coming months, as the emerging culture of hybrid works itself out, leadership will need to be ready to adjust its expectations of staff, be prepared to clearly communicate workplace norms, and in time, assess what this means for the design of the workplace. And perhaps this could be one of those rare occasions where it makes sense to hold off on immediate physical changes in order to fully absorb unfolding employee preferences. In this evolving future, the organizations which figure out how best to implement hybrid work will generate the best outcomes.