Employers must strive for a new collective approach - Sarah Jackson OBE

There are many strands to the lasting legacy of Covid lockdown on how we work now. But one of the most significant for employers in 2023 is how to manage the shift from presenteeism to ‘me-ism’ where some workers prioritise personal needs and preferences over those of their team.

Most people agree that presenteeism isn’t a good measure of someone’s value and contribution. There’s also no doubt hybrid working is positive for most workers, and my research with Scottish employers responsible for circa 56,000 employees suggests they see organisational benefits from happier more productive workers too.

But in my conversations with employers, I came across whispers of concern about some negative impacts of hybrid working in particular on team or organisational performance, and I’ve spent time reflecting on why this is the case.

Before the pandemic, office workers were generally in the office all or most of the time. Even flexible workers, such as people working part time hours, tended to work their hours in the office with everyone else. It wasn’t always good for workers, with some negative impacts on their work life balance and family responsibilities. But for the organisation, it worked well.

Sarah Jackson OBE is a visiting professor at Cranfield University School of Management and a senior associate for Scottish social business Flexibility Works

Now hybrid working can mean the majority of office workers may be working flexibly off-site at any one time. It works well if you need to juggle work and home responsibilities, but in order to work well for organisations it has to be carefully managed by the team, or collective. It works less well when it’s driven by individual preferences, which can result in team fragmentation and significant reduction of shared time together.

To remedy this some managers instinctively want to pull people close – back the office and to the way things were. But expectations have changed. Hybrid is here to stay. If employers turn their back on hybrid, staff will likely leave and find the flexibility they’re looking for elsewhere.

What employers can and should be doing is finding ways to help rebuild collective commitment and responsibility. People need to understand their value to their wider team, including supporting colleagues and understanding the broader business. While some of this can be done remotely it’s better done in person. Remote and hybrid arrangements should be discussed and agreed with collective as well as individual needs and preferences in mind.

Employers should invest in their line managers to build confidence and capability in managing hybrid and remote workers. They should also introduce team protocols, where teams agree what tasks they want and need to be together for, when and how often they should be in the office and how to communicate if people are hybrid or remote.

Building in time for social connection is also essential for employers to strengthen team bonds. Adding a round of sandwiches or pizzas to the end of a team meeting is a simple and surprisingly effective way to draw people in, get them talking and ultimately thinking as a collective.

Sarah Jackson OBE is a visiting professor at Cranfield University School of Management and a senior associate for Scottish social business Flexibility Works. You can find the full research report on Flexibility Works’ website.

​Sarah Jackson OBE is a visiting professor at Cranfield University School of Management and a senior associate for Scottish social business Flexibility Works