Companies struggle with hybrid work plans: difficult meetings and busy times during the week

The insurer Prudential Financial Inc.,

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which expects most of its approximately 42,000 employees to work in the office half the time from Labor Day, wants to ensure that not all employees choose to stay home on Mondays and Fridays and then work in the office during the week. At the travel company Expedia Group Inc.,

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supervisors are trying to figure out how to hold face-to-face meetings that do not disadvantage those not in the room. Other employers, including the software company Twilio Inc.,

predict that the new era of work could lead to shuffling between teams, drawing employees to bosses who embrace their preferred work styles.

Hybrid work “is going to redefine expectations, rules and consents,” said Kevin McCarty, chief executive officer of Chicago-based consulting firm West Monroe, which employs 1,360 people, and is rethinking when its employees should work from home or come in. offices.

The new work style will undoubtedly be a new transition for workers who had to adjust to life at home a year ago. While executives say it would be easier to manage if every employee returns to an office or all stays at a distance, studies have repeatedly shown that most employees want a mixed approach as more adults are vaccinated. In a February survey of 1,000 companies commissioned by LaSalle Network, a national staffing and recruiting company, the majority of companies said they would adopt a hybrid model.

Companies have also surveyed their organizations to find out how employees feel. At Prudential

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Most employees indicated that they enjoyed working remotely, but lacked the planning, ideation and collaboration that takes place in person, said Rob Falzon, vice president of the company.

Prudential has redesigned its office space floor by floor, repurposing most of it for meeting rooms, collaboration, and open space, so people can connect more quickly. Mr Falzon said he insisted on adding video capability to more small conference rooms, not just conference rooms, so that people who work at home do not feel left out.

Like many employers, the company is reducing its physical footprint so that desks will not be available for people who want to go to the office more often, with exceptions for some employees, including merchants. “We don’t have a desk for you every day,” says Mr. Falzon. “We have a desk for you three days a week.”

Hybrid models vary by company. The technology company Adobe Inc.

plans to allow employees to work from home two to three days a week, with staff members able to reserve desks, said Gloria Chen, the company’s chief people officer. Other companies are reluctant to issue a specific number on the days allowed at home. Factors such as the length of a commute, the type of job and an employee’s seniority can determine how often an employee has to visit an office, executives say.

“We’re not going to prescribe it,” at the corporate level, said David Henshall, CEO at technology company Citrix Systems Inc.

“You will find the right balance based on the type of position you perform.”

Flexibility can bring challenges. If a team comes together in person, but not everyone can make it, it can end up being a sub-par experience for those not in the room, said Expedia CEO Peter Kern. The tour company opened the early stages of a sprawling campus – complete with rocks with Wi-Fi – on the shores of Seattle’s Elliott Bay before the pandemic, and plans to initially allow remote team meetings at the Headquarters.

However, Mr. Kern says he wonders if those on Zoom will receive the same level of learning, encouragement, and career growth as those in the room. Then there are the planning issues.

Managers may have to “set up group meetings according to some crazy algorithm of who is available when? Who has a flexible day, when? Kern says. “There’s a lot of friction in all of that. It’s much easier to say, ‘Everyone’s going to work.’ Now someone calls a meeting and you are all there. “

A new way of working requires the company to think differently about performance, says Mr. Kern. Managers need to be careful not to have biased judgments about those who might be spending less time in the office, forcing the company to “be really considerate of how we judge people and give people opportunities so we don’t end up with skewed results.”

Training and onboarding can be more challenging in a hybrid environment, especially when new hires have a harder time understanding corporate culture without regular, face-to-face interaction with colleagues, said Tom Gimbel, CEO of LaSalle Network. With younger workers “in order to learn, they need to be around the more experienced people,” he says.

Other companies have said they would allow remote work in limited circumstances. In a memo, executives at the New York Times Co.

said the company planned to reopen its headquarters in September and had no plans to go completely secluded. The company would “only approve remote work in places where the team and nature of the work can accommodate it.”

Some HR professionals say companies have little choice but to meet the demands of employees, as a rigid workplace could displace workers as the economy recovers, and because many employees have proven to be adept at working anywhere.

“Previously, the employer could just say, ‘This is our culture,’” says Tara Wolckenhauer, an HR manager at the payroll processor Automated Data Processing Inc.

“Employers need to step back and think very differently.”

—Krithika Varagur contributed to this article.

Write to Emily Glazer at [email protected] and Chip Cutter at [email protected]