A new Morgan Stanley report shows that most Fortune 500 companies do not have plans to return to the office five days a week.
The report tracking return-to-office plans across 61 major U.S. companies showed that 69% are adopting a hybrid work model moving forward.
Additionally, just 10% of firms showed a preference for office working, which is not surprising as the Delta variant caused companies to postpone their return-to-office plans until next year.
Although there is no concrete prediction on what the future of the workplace will look like, it is certain to operate much differently and serve a new purpose.
While just 34% of companies started bringing in staff during the third quarter, Morgan Stanley analysts believe that figure could grow to 70% by the end of March 2022. Still, this means another 30% of companies would continue to work flexibly.
Despite the office seeing life and some cities experiencing an uptick in occupancy and activity, it’s clear that returning to pre-pandemic levels may take longer than expected.