The pandemic brought about a huge shift in working norms with remote work being the only option for a lot of jobs. The high levels of uncertainty also meant that general levels of productivity and output increased, especially during the initial phases.
As things settled down, we also discovered the negative side of remote work — lack of separation between home and work life, loss of social connections, switch to more transactional work models, and so on.
As the world recovered from the pandemic, there were questions on whether we would see a fundamental shift in the ways of working. On the one hand, a return to office was the opportunity for people to rekindle old connections, broaden peer learning, and deepen their understanding of the broader organisation context. For the ambitious and the up and coming, return to office was a no brainer. For others, the hurdles of the daily commute, and the return to close supervision seemed insurmountable, leading to the movement for permanent return to work.
As the market slows down, more leaders are willing to be more vocal about the benefits of having a cohesive workforce that is exposed to organisational culture, is actively engaged with the broader team, and can leverage relationships more effectively. More and more organisations are moving away from the rigid concept of working hours. Employees increasingly have more flexibility and autonomy to plan their work, leading to increased creativity and ownership.
At PhonePe, we have found that having work from office as the norm helps create communities that can engage and enable each other leading to a happier, and more productive workspace. While the world swings from one extreme to the other, we believe that work life balance has always been about balancing the needs of all stakeholders so we can together deliver the best results.
The current technological advances mean that the conversation about work from home can never be about operational concerns such as tighter oversight or cost savings. Instead, the starting point has to be about the nature of work, and the need for cohesion. Some jobs are ideally suited for work from home, where the job requires minimum collaboration, can be independently measured, and requires the individual to essentially operate alone. An office environment can in fact hinder productivity in these cases, and limit ability to leverage non-standardised pools of talent such as housewives, retired people, and others who may not find it possible to be at a defined location for eight hours.
On the other hand, a lot of jobs require teamwork, a strong sense of the organisational culture, and an agile mindset. Work from home for these roles can sometimes prove to be highly ineffective.
We also know now that most employees can be trusted to manage priorities effectively without rigid requirements on badge-in and badge-out times. The traditional environment of close supervision and tight oversight is definitely long gone. So all organisations will need to shift their work style to one where employees are measured on results delivered and not for face time, opening up space for increased creativity, and collaboration.
With the economic slowdown, there is opportunity for organisations to think more creatively about what their needs from their people are, and how work from home can enable these. Depending on what side you want to be on, there are good arguments for work from home both helping save costs, increasing productivity, and also the exact opposite. But with all the tools at our disposal, the question should not be of whether one is better than the other, but about what best suits your organisation, and your people.
Manmeet Sandhu is Head of Human Resource, PhonePe. Views are personal, and do not represent the stand of this publication.
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