Until recently it seemed that work from home, or even work from anywhere was a Covid-19 created employee policy that had settled into present workforces nicely. We had generally agreed that 2 days from home and three days in the office was a good balance, and seemed to be well received by employees and employers alike. But no! these headlines began to appear this year:

Elon Musk at Tesla “Anyone who wishes to do remote work must be in the office for a minimum (and I mean *minimum*) of 40 hours per week or depart Tesla”. Bob Iger at Disney “Workers must return to the office from Monday through to Thursday to improve the company’s creativity and culture”. David Solomon at Goldman Sachs “Employees must now return to the office five days a week”

It seems this lead has been taken by large companies in USA and UK, and in many cases met with significant employee push-back (I believe there would be infinitely more pushback should we still be in a candidate short market). New Zealand companies are beginning to respond (much more subtly though). Most notably a recent strong message from Nicola Willis was for Government leaders to bring their employees back to the office 5 days per week. We find it interesting that the government sector, who created the broadest flexibility around work from home, now has the biggest challenge and the most work to do to complete a U-turn on this policy.  

Find Recruitment believe that work from home for at least one or two days a week is a great idea for a number of reasons.

1. It builds trust between an employer and employee – one of the main reasons WFH was slow to come was the situation where managers thought “How do I know you are actually working when you are at home!, How do I measure your productivity” In reality most employees cite working longer hours at home to compensate for this factor, and it appears productivity hasn’t diminished post COVID-19.
2. It provides a break from what can be an expensive and stressful commute into the office. Bus & train fares, as well as petrol prices and parking, have risen significantly over the past 4 years. The reliability of services hasn’t improved and often this leads to delayed arrivals at the office and unnecessary stress and expense for employees.
3. It is a great retention tool. When your employees are satisfied with their work life balance and flexibility, they are far more likely to stay in their roles and not be tempted to look for a new role. Flexible working ranks ahead of salaries when employees are surveyed.
4. It suits some peoples working style much better than being in an office 5 days a week. Some people admit that they much prefer being in the office so they can focus on work, but for others the office can be a distraction. WFH gives everyone option to create the right balance for their needs.
5. Reduces sick leave – If you are perfectly well enough to work but possibly have lingering cold symptoms, you would typically have to stay at home and take sick leave. However, with WFH you can have minor symptoms and still work in a full capacity. Likewise, if you have mild Covid symptoms work from home can be a good solution.
6. It allows you as an employer to downsize your office space and make significant savings on rent due to the reduced number of desks needed to facilitate your teams – we are seeing this economic factor across our market.

It will be interesting to see where this lands in the next couple of years, but at Find we believe WFH is here to stay and it remains a good, healthy and attractive balance for hardworking employees. The debate is also interesting as it represents only a third of workers, with two thirds being unable to work from home (think bus drivers, restaurant employees, retailers etc) but often seems to be more widespread than this based on the volume of media coverage.  

It is worth considering that when the market picks up and talent becomes scarce again, your WFH policy could well be the difference between attracting top talent and missing out. It is certainly unlikely in our view that all employees will return to the 1990’s style of 100% work from the office. We just think back to 2022 – 2023 when unemployment was 3.6% and even leading employer brands struggled to attract talent without offering WFH options.

Looking for more Market Insights? Check out our Q3 2024 State of the Market report right here.