Hybrid and human
There’s a lot of chatter going on at present about the hybrid workplace – a workplace that incorporates working from home, a local hub and an organisations central HQ. Something most of us will now experience as we move forward from what has been the greatest change management programme in the fastest time in business history.
The question is will a hybrid workplace journey help us to be more human at work? To answer this question we are going to use the recent Covid Memorial Wall as an example of what we think employees, staff, all of us as humanity are looking for at present.
Around 130,000 hearts have been painted on a kilometre-long section of wall opposite the Houses of Parliament on London's Southbank since early April 2021 and at the date of writing this blog thousands more are being added.
What does this tell us about where we are at as people at present? We think it hints towards a desire for unity, unity in this shared experience we have been through but also to be unified moving forward. There have been many comments in the press about where we should/could do our work from.
“David Solomon suggested that it (working from home) does not suit the work culture at Goldman Sachs.”
Goldman Sachs view seemed to be echoed by our countries leadership as well as Boris is quoted “people have ‘had enough days off’ working from home”. Maybe people have had enough of being disconnected, but that doesn’t mean we all have to go back to the office like before, does it?
When we visited the Covid Memorial Wall at Southbank you could actually feel a sense of being human together. This collective expression of connectedness and unity as we each drew a heart on the wall facing parliament is a symbol and outpouring of human identity and love for each other.
Other organisations have swung the other way in terms of where to work:
“Most will be asked to work from home 40% of the time”
In a BBC new article BP has told office-based staff they will be expected to spend two days a week working from home after lockdown restrictions ease. The oil giant said in meetings last month that most would be asked to work from home 40% of the time, or two days a week for full-time employees. The new "hybrid" work model will affect 25,000 BP staff, with 6,000 in the UK.
The hybrid workplace will emerge as we all adapt to living with COVID 19 and the threat of other virus’s in the future. The realisation to many traditional organisations that there is another ‘hybrid’ way to work will cause large scale change.
But the question on Go Humans mind is how can we ensure that we treat each other as humans through this change. Here’s 5 things worth considering when thinking about hybrid working:
5 hybrid working questions…
Do you have to follow the crowd, how can you use hybrid working to be creative and do what’s right for your organisation?
Can you use this as an opportunity to talk each other, canvas opinion and feedback, employees have had to be remarkably innovative over the last 12 months what ideas might they be able to contribute?
Could you think about the places people could work as a series of settings rather than black and white home or office?
Can you come together with team leaders and model out different scenarios of where people might work in a typical week?
Remember we are all desiring a sense of connectedness and unity as part of our next steps, what might this look like for your organisation?
Don't be afraid of relinquishing control
Hybrid isn't about lack of control it's about giving control. As we have already read, in times of need, challenges like global pandemics, we need something to help guide us through into a new world and new ways of thinking. Beware of trying to control hybrid, it won't work. We couldn't control the last 12 months and where did that get us? It showed as a nation we are innovative, faithful and dedicated to trying to do our best for our organisations. Yes it's been hard, and many are ready to go back to the office and desperate for some kind of normality – but this is a moment to seize in the history of the workplace.
Here at Go Human we want to encourage hybrid and human. We all could put a heart on that wall, all of us have lost someone, lost something. All of us now know more about ourselves and what really matters in life. Now is a time to embrace humanity as we enter the hybrid workplace era.
