Even with an accelerated pace of vaccinations, it may take the rest of 2021 to lure office workers back to the office. Industries like retail that benefit from face-to-face collaboration between merchants and design teams may want to consider a phased reopening, where other functional areas like finance can return more slowly. The LVMH mandate to its staff looks impractical and (worse) inhumane, given that very few of its workers have access to both rounds of vaccine in the next two weeks.

It will most likely land on a flexible option as that will be a happy medium, fostering more effective communications between co-workers to meet and plan in the office while using the days working from home to do the work and execute the plan. Coming back together in the office a few days a week makes total sense, but if we do it too early it does not.

Ask, maybe. Force, no. Not at this time. If the goal is to keep people healthy and happy, companies need to remain flexible right now.

The work from home Pandora’s box has been opened and it will hard to put it all back. While there appears to be almost universal acceptance that work from home will remain in some state, there is no clear path to exactly how to best accomplish this. In fact Google’s CEO recently stated in a WSJ article that he’s concerned about maintaining Google’s culture if work from home were to become permanent. The concerns about the lack of employee spontaneous interaction, creativity and sense of community are all legitimate concerns of working remotely, but at the same time, there are also benefits and desire to continue to work from home at least for some part of the week by employees. Regardless of how employers deal with it, work from home is likely here to stay in some shape or form permanently.

The predominant lasting impact is going to be hybrid work models. There are two things that will directly result. The first is downsized and consolidated office spaces, probably with open use designs where whoever is in the office that day can use the space. The second is a shift to production/performance versus hourly or salary compensation models. The result will be much more effective, and cost effective, office staff for employers.

I am in process of designing a benchmark study on this very question! To be published in a couple of months. My personal opinion is that most corporate workers will continue working from home. While there are some issues around propagating corporate culture, in every other way, home work is a win-win. Cheaper to build offices, more productivity due to lack of commute.

The only piece I have some questions about is the hourly workforce. So rather than just opine, RSR is going to ask retailers. I hope to read collective opinions!

“As the pandemic eases” is the thing, isn’t it? Is it safe to be out and about with people you know but do not know where they have been? It’s still something I think about each time I work in our office.

There has to be a lot of flexibility built into any plan to bring workers back. Are parents still required to home school? Is day care available and is it safe?

In a work setting, collaboration is better when people are together. As wonderful as Zoom as been throughout the pandemic it will never replace the connectivity that happens when we are physically working in the same space, so I understand the corporate desire to bring office workers back together.

At some point we need to get back to business but I’m not sure that time is now. The article mentions the arrival of vaccinations being part of the deciding factor. Where I live getting a vaccination is the equivalent of winning the lottery; it’s not something companies can count on yet.

From personal experience, people that have had it (which turns out was a lot) can begin to return to the office, those that have not, should continue to work from home until they get a vaccine shot. Kids here in this state have been going to school for a while now but have the option to remote learn. It will take major coordinating to make sure all bases are covered.

The are certain tasks that fit the work from home process. But any business that relies on innovation, creativity, new ideas, and better solutions will fall behind if their primary focus for interaction is Zoom.

Let’s face it: most Americans don’t have access to a vaccine. That may change at some point, but let’s not jump the gun. This will be especially true of companies with headquarters in high-rise buildings — isn’t restricting elevator car access going to be a problem?

Salesforce recently announced that they would have all three; flex, fully remote and office-based with the latter being the smallest part of their workforce. I don’t see most corporate workers returning 40 hours per week. I see a lot more hybrid – with teams using tools to figure out agreed upon guardrails. And if workers do return to the office, being their will be much more flexible.

Corporate staff might lose some chemistry aspects but so many of us are figuring out how to adapt to work and create culture remotely. I adjust at a design school and the students are all well-versed in virtual collaboration tools like Miro and Teams. In-person might be reserved for team building and bonding/social events, etc., whereas work will fall into hybrid.

There are so many moving parts and variables involved here that it is impossible to come up with a focused “should” answer, unless it’s to say that companies should be flexible. Company culture, ease of commuting, parenting/schooling issues, timing and access to vaccines all play a role. It will take most of 2021 to sort these issues out so that companies and their workforce can determine what the next new work paradigm looks like. Needless to say Toto, we aren’t working in Kansas any longer.

There is going to be a lot of empty office space as companies are slow to return business-in-the-office as usual. And, then some will not return at all – or at least a small percentage of what they had prior to COVID-19. The primary goal is safety. Any business should ask, “How can I operate in the most effective and safe way?” The answer is about health and that will dictate if it’s safe to return to the office. The next question is, “What will be the most effective and efficient way?” The answer is about numbers and productivity. Regardless, safety and health trump all answers to any question related to this topic.

The determining factors for many companies will likely be what industry they are in and the type of work the employees do. There may be some companies who will require employees to return to their offices/places of work full time, but I expect that the hybrid model will endure and be the most popular. A question is, will employees want full time remote if they are asked to accept a lower pay rate because they elected to work in a lower cost of living location?

First question first. I don’t see “most” corporate workers returning to offices until “most” corporate workers – and everyone else – are vaccinated, and that’s not even considering the emergence of a variant that the vaccine isn’t effective against. If, or when, they do return I think we will see some hybrid emerge as the “new normal” for office workers. As to what might be lost — besides a good deal of socialization time, unnecessary meetings, etc. — that depends on the company, the worker’s role, and a whole host of other variables. But I wouldn’t be worrying about changing office decors until this fall at the earliest and possibly the first quarter of 2022 at the rate things are going.

Return to work may be the most complex part of the entire pandemic experience. Some employees will have loved their remote experience. Some will have hated it. Most will be somewhere in between. That means it will come down to corporations establishing the rules.

That said, a firm demand for employees to return to the office seems quite risky until at least this coming summer as the number of vaccinated continues to grow. Given that in Oregon and Colorado they’ve just barely opened vaccinations to 80 year olds, it’s not likely that many employees will be vaccinated any time soon.

With the challenges of rolling out the vaccines and the continued escalations of Covid-19 cases, we still have a pandemic horizon. While companies can certainly ask, without the precautions and protections of a fully vaccinated society, nobody should be forced to return to the office if they are not considered essential workers.

If there is any silver lining of this horrific pandemic, it’s that the majority of companies have very effectively shifted to a remote operating model, keep their business going, all while protecting their associates and clients. It’s not acceptable for any company to mandate a full or partial return to the office until we as a society feel that it’s safe to do so.

The fact is that it all comes down to trust and transparency. While the relentless zoom call is fatiguing, we as professionals have proven that we could shift and be quite effective remotely.

I think a hybrid model will be far more acceptable and most employers will embrace that moving forward. There are certain cultures that are just setup to work more efficiently with everyone back in the office, but providing some flexibility to make employees comfortable is the best approach.