I’ve been seeing quite a few newsfeed headlines of late discussing the pros/cons of employees returning-to-office (RTO) based working—implicitly in the post-COVID environment. They seem to basically all fall onto either one or the other sides of the argument1
PRO: the articles/arguments FOR returning to the office generally seem to centre around vague statements about restoring/improving productivity or morale and are usually attributed to CEOs or Boards or similar. The higher profile the name quoted, the more the author seems to feel that the position is valid. I don’t believe I have have never seen any serious attempt to present objective evidence to support these positions.
CON: articles/arguments AGAINST returning to the office generally seem to be sourced from line staff or middle managers, with a smattering of consultant/research study reports thrown in. These positions usually seem to cite a lot of quite subjective reactions and commentary, with even the reported studies generally being centred around matters such as “what makes us happy”.
Assertion:
Neither of the sides of the RTO discussion will generally prevail while arguments remain at the level of essentially “religious differences”. Sadly, many (if not most) managers are unable to articulate any reason for RTO other than the inherently confrontational “because I said so”.
A solution:
Management by outcomes is not a new idea; it has been talked about, written about and even implemented within organisations and governments for quite a few years (as a quick google search will show). Unfortunately, however, it is not widely adopted in practice, even where it is espoused in theory.
I suspect this to be primarily because defining, agreeing and measuring/recording performance against objectives is actually non-trivial in every operational environment that I have worked in or discussed or observed. Even seemingly simple work processes need careful thought (and testing/modifying over time) to ensure reasonableness from both the staff’s and organisation’s perspectives. For example, there is little point in using an objective that does not contribute to the organisational mission/goals; it will only “train” staff to perform essentially useless activities. Similarly, staff should not be able to readily “game the system” to artificially inflate/improve their own performance results.
Nevertheless, if managers—ideally in conjunction with relevant staff—can actually determine, measure and record appropriate work objectives, the location where such work is performed becomes much less relevant.