A survey of human resource leaders from the Conference Board shows that a mere 4% of leaders are requiring a full-office return. This indicates that hybrid policies have emerged as the most popular post-pandemic work policy.
These findings come as financial organizations have become scrutinized for their desire to bring employees back into the workplace five days a week. However, just 45% of HR leaders stated that they were requiring some workers to return this amount of time.
“We were all pretty shocked,” said Robin Erickson, vice president of human capital at the Conference Board. “We were surprised given what we’re hearing about how many employers are requiring workers to come back full time.”
The survey also showed that 90% of employers were embracing hybrid schedules. While Erickson believes that this arrangement will prevail as a popular option in the post-pandemic era, he also anticipates that the need for a full-office return may increase as jobs become scarce.
Still, Stanford University economics professor Nicholas Bloom is not surprised by the 4% figure. Bloom’s own research on remote work shows that, among those who can work from home, the average number of days they can do so is 2.3 each week.
“The share of employees doing jobs that can currently work from home (e.g. office jobs) but are forced into the office five days a week … is very small,” said Bloom. “It makes no sense—employees are happier and more productive when they work from home two or three days a week, so very few employers are forcing them back to the office full time.”
