Dive Brief:
- Two-thirds of workers polled by career site Monster in September said they would quit if required to return to the office full time, according to results the company sent to HR Dive. Forty percent said they’d consider quitting even if required to come into the office only one day per week, the findings showed.
- Roughly one-quarter of the 1,806 workers polled said they’d prefer to have other benefits reduced before returning to the office, including PTO and lunch breaks.
- Among those surveyed, 54% are still working remotely and have never met their colleagues.
Dive Insight:
Flexibility — and particularly the flexibility to work remotely five days a week if an employee prefers — remains a top perk for workers even as more companies open up their offices and introduce more stringent return-to-work policies.
For many, the benefits of working from home are numerous. Three-quarters of respondents to Monster’s survey said they would lose the perk of doing “quick chores,” like throwing in a load of laundry, if required to be in the office. A recent survey from software platform meQuilibrium found that remote and hybrid employees experienced more psychological safety. On-site employees were more likely to feel mistakes were held against them and that their organizations rejected people for being different.
Implementing effective hybrid work has been a challenge for many organizations since the system became more widespread in 2020 and 2021, although some recent data suggests employers and workers still prefer the system to fully on-site requirements. Monster’s results, however, suggest the preference for fully remote still edges out hybrid work for now — and it isn’t very close.
Some companies, particularly those in tech, have embraced fully remote work. Yelp’s CEO, Jeremy Stoppelman, announced the company’s decision to go fully remote in June and told The Washington Post that hybrid work represented “the hell of half measures.” In July, Yelp’s chief people officer Carmen Orr spoke with HR Dive, noting that teams could be just as productive in a remote environment while employee satisfaction remains high.
Other workplaces do seem to be adjusting to hybrid work, however. The system provides one clear benefit: it provides employees, including those who do prefer the office, flexibility to decide for themselves. The next big hurdle in hybrid work may be in providing clarity about expectations and ensuring — if working from home is an option — that employees aren’t penalized for doing so, either implicitly or explicitly.
