New rules of work in a hybrid world
Before lockdown, I was exploring the ways in which flexible work wasn’t delivering what it promised. Now, in week 12 of lockdown, we’re heading into a ‘max-flex’ world where many are assuming that from September we will be working in a hybrid model: our time split between home and work. Which means we’re going to have to figure out how to make flex and remote work—and not necessarily just for the next few months.
During the weekly JLA webinar Patrick Dixon, a virologist, noted that the shortest time it has ever taken to find a vaccine was four years. Ebola took 43 years, the average is about 10, and The Lancet says many infectious disease experts argue that even 18 months for a first vaccine is an incredibly aggressive schedule. Given the concerns about second waves, especially in colder weather, it may be that September turns out not even to be the end of the beginning for Covid-19.
Which raises the question of what will be the rules of work in this ‘next normal’ (as McKinsey is calling it)? How will our usual guides for good practice work now? Take managing by wandering around, for example. How does that play on the argy-bargy of an all-hands Zoom with enough latency to make your knee speed-twitch?
Do I matter? Do you?
A team leader said to me this week,
“For the first time in my adult life, work feels like just a job and not my way of life. It’s an enormous change, because suddenly I don’t feel excited about the day, it’s just a list of tasks (and I’m not sure anyone would notice if I didn’t do them). I miss the office, I miss the laughs, the colleagues, I feel… less consequential.”
If she already feels less consequential, how will clients feel?
When instead of visiting city-centre offices with three-floor atriums, gleaming with marble, steel and glass, they talk to ‘Steve’ in his backroom, framed by boxes of Lego and old suitcases. Will they still see Steve as the high-value proposition they signed up for? Let alone Steve’s colleague, who lives in a shared rental, and works from her ironing board.
It reminds me of a bank that used to send a decorator round when people worked from home to make their working space match the real office.
One way will be through digital communications with emotional resonance.
A so-so talk or rushed town hall might be OK in person. But if you’re having to make it into a film and share it widely, it needs to sing.
Someone at Penguin told me this week about a video shared to mark their usual annual event which brought a tear to her eye as she remembered all that is good about where she works. That kind of engagement will need to be more common.
Especially when many leaders are quietly battling the knowledge they will have to cut their talent costs by 10% or more. Wondering if there are better ways than just demanding sacrifices from each team.
Is giving the same people two or three days a week instead of five an option?
Would some even prefer it?
How will that be managed?
How will those arrangements even be forged without the opportunity to meet in person?
The challenges of blended work
There so many questions: a new set of rules is required. The rules for hybrid work. Let me know what needs to be included.
- Christine x
