The Implications of Hybrid Working
Traditional Office Culture is becoming a thing of the Past
PWC have told their 22,000 staff that they can now start and finish work when they want and spend 40 to 60% of their time remote working. Nationwide and BP have taken it one step further, embracing a full-time home working model.
As we slowly move out of lockdown, it’s obvious that for many of the 32million UK workforce, the 9 to 5 pre Covid office culture will be a thing of the past.
Not all work can be carried out remotely
Is a remote or hybrid working model feasible for all industries across all sectors?
McKinsey have studied the time spent on different activities within various occupations. Unsurprisingly, their analysis found that remote work is best suited to those whose roles require cognitive thinking and problem solving, managing and developing people, and data processing. Finance, Management, Professional Services and Information Sectors are amongst those with the highest potential for remote work. The findings also suggested that highly skilled, highly educated workers are those most likely to succeed in their roles while working remotely.
What about the UK defence and supply chain sectors ?
Unlike many of the professional services roles identified by McKinsey as being suited to remote work, there are many jobs in the defence and defence supply chain sector that are not so clearly defined. While some activities during a typical day lend themselves to remote work, there are other tasks that require a physical presence and a more hands on approach.
The importance of technology for hybrid working
The transition to remote working has been seamless for many thanks to advances in communication and collaboration technology. The businesses that have moved from an office to remote model successfully have heavily invested in the required communication technology and software. Beyond having a work-issued laptop and smartphone, collaboration software (eg Miro, SoCreative, Kahoot and Jira7), meeting software (eg MS Teams, WebEx, Skype and Zoom), communication software (eg Lync and Jabber) are used widely in many industries to support hybrid working.
It is clear that the ability to remote work depends on these technologies, and whilst financial and professional services organisations have prioritised this spending, the public admin and defence sectors have not. If the UK defence and supply chain sectors are to be able to offer any form of hybrid working to their workforce, they may need to consider greater investment and a balanced risk approach to communication technology, software, and hybrid office infrastructure.
Hybrid Working has implications for power, influence and competence
Hybrid working is inextricably tied to power; it creates power differentials within teams that can damage relationships, impede effective collaboration and could ultimately reduce performance. It reinforces divisions between the ‘head office/ major sites’ crowd and the ‘remote working’ crowd. It’s easier to have a team of 20 all being remote rather than 15 people in a room and five remotes. To lead effectively in a hybrid environment, leaders and managers must recognise and actively manage sources of power that can impede or facilitate hybrid work.
Managers may not have the skills to manage Hybrid Working Teams and Projects
The burden of delivering change, including the transition from total lockdown remote working to post June 2021 Hybrid Working will fall most heavily on those with management responsibilities. A successful hybrid working model will depend on managers having the people, process, communication and collaboration skills to leverage the contribution of the wider team. Existing core management skills will need to be sharpened, as one Treehouse client said “I need to work out how to package bundles of work for staff to do when they’re working from home.” Different ways of working will be appropriate at different stages in a product life-cycle so hybridity working factors will need to become a normal part of project planning and design reviews.
Staff may need to develop the skills, confidence and mindset for hybrid working
It is not only senior leaders that will need to learn new skills to actively manage hybrid working. Team members will also be required to gain a range of soft skills to increase their contribution and thrive in a hybrid environment. Adaptability, willingness to learn new ways of working and to develop trust and proficiency in new technology are all keys to a successful transition from on site to off site working.
The transition to a hybrid workforce also requires a ‘people-first’ strategy, one that establishes the skills, agility and learning culture an organisation and its workforce will need to be successful.
Most importantly, we need to identify the wants, needs and drivers of staff as they embark on their own personal journeys to becoming part of a hybrid workforce.
Onboarding and talent management can be more challenging
Most of the learning in organisations is informal or on-the-job. CIPD’s report identified how managers were conscious of how remote working during Covid 19 had reduced opportunities for ‘shadowing, and the things that you just instinctively pick up by being sat with a group of people with a similar responsibility to you’.
Informal learning is important throughout a career but there are several points when learning needs are particularly intense. These include:
new starters at junior (apprentice, graduate) and senior levels,
following a promotion,
when taking on a new task or area of responsibility and
when switching teams.
To address this managers need to be alert to recognising the points when more support is needed and to organise more structured development opportunities. This could include organising a wider support network instead of a single mentor together with better documentation. In project based work, managers could deliberately mix people up on consecutive projects to create greater opportunities for development.
Seize the opportunity
If there is one positive to come out of the Covid pandemic, it’s that the ingrained working norms of the past have been reviewed and re-evaluated. Whether a remote or hybrid working model is a practical and realistic choice for every industry and every role is doubtful, but the pandemic has made managers and team members think and consider alternatives. Organisations that take this opportunity to review their working models and take into consideration the opinions and requirements of all team members from the top down have the greatest chance of making any new style of working a success.
References
Susan Lund, Anu Madgavkar, James Manyika, and Sven Smit (2020), What’s next for remote work: An analysis of 2000 tasks, 800 jobs and nine countries (McKinsey & Company)
The Office for National Statistics 2019 report
The Office of Communications (OFCOM)’s 2019 Connected Nations report
Ismail Amla (2019), Empowering people in a hybrid workforce (Capita)
Emma Jacobs (2020), How to make the hybrid workforce model work (FT.com)
Mark Mortensen and Martine Haas (2021) Making the Hybrid Workplace Fair (Harvard Business Review)
(CIPD's) 2021 report, Flexible Working: Lessons from the Pandemic