Make the office more fun – if you want workers to return

Coercive measures will fail if the goal is to encourage workers back to offices and re-establish a creative and collaborative working environment, writes Dr Nahla Khaddage Bou-Diab. Instead, a workplace culture must be created that motivates people to return.

Working from home has led company culture into the doldrums. Offices are empty, meeting rooms are barren, and cafes are half empty at lunch time. Clearly, organisations need to encourage people back to the office – after all, the culture, the lifeblood of the firm, collaboration and innovation rely on it.

But EY’s recent office attendance monitoring is no way to do that.

In January, it was revealed that EY – a member of accountancy’s Big Four – had begun to monitor their employees’ swipe card entry data. Of course, while this may persuade their employees to comply with hybrid working guidelines, its true purpose is to usher staff back to the office.

Unfortunately, EY is not the only giant issuing this return-to-office mandate. Bank of America has taken a more direct approach, sending “letters of education” to staff who have not been attending the office.

Working from home is not great for culture – I’ll be the first to say that. It hinders cross-department collaboration, hampering productivity, the execution of deliverables and, as a result, innovation.

But these return-to-office initiatives are no solution. They create atmospheres of control, throw talented staff into “survival mode”, and make these people feel they have to comply with every demand their large corporation makes.

Decision time

In my opinion, these new return-to-office trends show that companies now need to decide what they want from their employees.

There are two options: if you want to purchase your employees’ hours and dictate their time, then, sure, measuring attendance is a “necessary” tool. But, if you want creativity from your staff, then you need to value other metrics that indicate creativity. You cannot apply a controlling mechanism; you need to make your talent care for the company’s success.

Culture is created and impacted in many ways. Of course, behaviour is one of these; the behaviour of your peers and leadership teams influences both the working and social environments of the office. But it’s also impacted by policies – and, more importantly, how these policies are implemented.

Let’s bring it back to EY’s monitoring scheme. Even passive methodologies like that give staff the impression they’re being watched, creating a chilling Big Brother effect through the office floors. Bank of America’s approach is even worse, essentially issuing staff with a formally written ultimatum.

Heritage, logos, beanbags, potted plants and merchandise are no way to create culture. Leadership teams, including the C-suite, need to decide what they want from their employees – then they should create a culture that supports their goals.

Workplace culture

I recently spotted a study by Deloitte, another member of the Big Four, which noted that 94% of executives and 88% of employees believed a “distinct” workplace culture was important to business success. “Distinct” is key here.

Recently, although it is, admittedly, quite left field, the CEO of cloud-based security firm Verkada – valued at around $3bn – came out and revealed that he’s implemented a 3-3-3 perk across the firm, whereby three or more employees can put food and drink on expenses if they go out together after 3pm. This approach seems to have strengthened the bonds and connections between staff – and has encouraged employees to see each other in person, not over a Teams call at home.

Of course, this is not a perfect culture: paying people to socialise is in no way a long-term solution; after all, it does not secure the bonds between staff, only incentivises them. Instead, Verkada, and other companies, would benefit from re-examining their cultures and using their characteristics to spread a sense of belonging throughout their organisations: this would trigger the need among its team members to be together and socialise. Revolving recruitment strategy around culture will, as a result, create a sense of belonging both through the teams and the organisation as a whole.

Nonetheless, I will admit that Verkada’s CEO, Filip Kaliszan, deserves praise. He, as a top-level C-suite executive, has taken the reins of his company’s culture. He spotted an issue, namely the separation and friction caused by remote working practices, and implemented a strategy to solve it.

Bring people together

More C-suite leaders should do the same. And, as the working from home crisis has spiralled, it is imperative that they now step up to the plate – HR can no longer execute the sheer scale of the task at hand.

I understand that encouraging people back to the office is a tough ask, but monitoring staff or issuing strongly worded letters only exacerbates the issue. It will only make people want to stay at home, risking increased levels of employee turnover and, as these firms are known graduate employers, the loss of potential applicants fresh out of university.

Now, as people continue to seek the comfort of their own homes, organisations need to figure out how to adapt – and become places their employees gravitate towards. So, here’s the solution: as Verkada has done, find a way to make the office more fun than home. Find ways to bring people together, to allow them to interact – and create an environment that makes people want to brainstorm together.

The days are gone when personal and professional lives should be separate. Companies need to let the whole person, the human – and not just the job title or function – into the organisation.

The future success of these businesses relies on it.

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