Is the home working bubble about to burst?
As the UK tries to re-establish a post-lockdown state of ‘normal’ it follows that many workers are starting to return to the office. However, there are still large numbers working from home or flexi working and it’s clear that many businesses are grappling with how to navigate the next stage in post-covid employment.
According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), at some point during 2020, 25.9% of the working population were completing duties at home. That’s roughly around 8.4 million people. For many, the removal of the commute has many advantages: increased leisure time, cost savings and greater flexibility for managing work and home life. This has been utterly liberating to many and for some people unaccustomed to being able to watch a child in a school event or eat a family meal due to previously inflexible roles, completely eye-opening.
However, this freedom of choice could now be coming to end, as firms start to consider how to manage employees working from home over the long term.
It has recently been reported that major technology firms in the US such as Facebook and Twitter are considering reducing the amount they pay to workers who choose to work away from their head offices. Employees at Google will face a pay cut of up to 25% if they work remotely. It appears for now that only a handful of UK employers are following in the footsteps of our neighbours over the Atlantic, with only 7% of organisations changing pay to reflect homeworking, as reported this month in the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) Reward Management Strategy. According to Charles Cotton of the CIPD, there are clearly “considerable legal and practical challenges, not to mention the implications on organisational fairness and inclusion”.
On the flip side, some firms are considering paying more for roles that do not allow for flexibility, such as workers on construction sites, offering a premium and enhanced job security for ‘inflexibility’. It may be that employers consider introducing a two-tier pay structure that reflects where the majority of work is done and offering home working as a flexible benefit, much like other employee benefits such as healthcare and childcare vouchers.
A recent survey of approximately 4000 individuals on LinkedIn by The Female Lead (an educational charity created by loyalty and data entrepreneur Edwina Dunn) saw 78% of respondents vote ‘no’ to taking a pay cut to continue partially or fully working from home. This clearly would be an unpopular move.
However, at The Ink Group we are starting to see some evidence that employees working from home are beginning to miss the water-cooler chat, the office banter, the company of other people. This is particularly true of individuals living at home alone and even for those with a busy family life; the desire to escape ‘back to the office’ may start to be ringing a little louder. The novelty of a 30 second commute from the bedroom to the desk may be losing its appeal because despite the likelihood that trains will continue to run late, as human beings we are social creatures by nature; and it’s hard to argue that social interaction is not a fundamental necessity in our lives:
“We human beings are social beings. We come into the world as the result of others’ actions. We survive here in dependence on others. Whether we like it or not, there is hardly a moment of our lives when we do not benefit from others’ activities. For this reason, it is hardly surprising that most of our happiness arises in the context of our relationships with others.” ― Dalai Lama XIV
We will be keeping a close eye on these developments and will be sure to update our HR Managed Services clients on the current mood and its potential impact on the policies and practices that might apply to your workforce.