Virtual office is not optimal environment for all workers, bosses
When you shine a light on guarded secrets, defensive rage invariably emerges. I have never received such vitriolic, often obscenity- laden responses in 28 years of writing for the Financial Post and The Star before that, as I did for my recent column, discussing employees spending time on whatever they fancied while purportedly ‘working’ from home.
The self- righteous virtue signalling from the ‘ remote- work’ lobby was staggering. They have reason to be defensive and there are many of them. A Robert Half survey found that 85 per cent of employees performing remote work hope to continue that arrangement when the pandemic ends. Some are undoubtedly working harder than ever, taking advantage of their saved commutes. Others are not. They prefer the lifestyle and the fact that they can spend a portion of their day doing anything but working, with management being none the wiser. They fear the day they will be recalled to the office.
History dictates that likelihood. We have had many previous experiences with large- scale remote work. In almost every case, despite companies’ real estate savings, it has failed and employees were recalled to their offices. IBM Corp., Aetna Inc., Best Buy Co., The Bank of America Corp., Yahoo!, AT&T Inc. and Reddit Inc. have all tried it.
In a feature titled The Long Unhappy History of Working from Home, David Streitfeld of The New York Times reported in June that remote employees “often felt marginalized, which made them less loyal. Creativity, innovation and serendipity seemed to suffer.”
When Patrick Pichette, the former chief financial officer at Google, was asked in 2013, “How many people telecommute at Google?” he liked to answer, “As few as possible.” That is not surprising. Those companies reported a decline in engagement and collaboration, which are more difficult to develop over a screen while simultaneously being distracted by the many tempting invisible ( to others) diversions that do not exist in in- person meetings.
Forgetting its earlier lesson, Google was one of the earliest employers to send their employees home during this pandemic. The company’s experience has been mixed. Its current CFO, Ruth Porat, recently noted work from home was, after a rocky start, working, but highlighted the importance of collaboration that she believes best takes place in the workplace. However her ultimate conclusion was that “innovation benefits from people coming together. It’s about collaboration, it’s about serendipity. And it’s collaboration not just within your team but across teams. So we do look forward to getting people back in the office.”
The chief economist at the Bank of England, Andy Haldane, also recently addressed the question of reduced productivity during the pandemic. “These differences in the productivity effects of home- working, pre- and post- COVID, are perhaps unsurprising,” he said. “Mandatory home- working thrust large numbers of workers into an alien working environment — their kitchens, bedrooms and attics. There was no option of self- selecting. That meant, for many, not only a worse working environment but a steep learning curve as they adapted to new ways of working.”
Some recent studies have shown slightly increased productivity but those are largely self- reported by employees, incented to establish that it is working, notably with little or no objective measure.
Although anecdotal, my own law firm had its own enforced experiment when most of our lawyers chose to work from home in March. After a couple of weeks, productivity plummeted over 30 per cent, easily measurable in billable docketed hours.
Interestingly, when shown the numbers, everyone was surprised, believing that they were being equally productive. Being an essential service, we were able to remain open and decided to call everyone back four months ago, staggering it initially with every second workday.
Once fully back, productivity shot right back up, again without people believing that they were working any harder. That is the difficulty with many of these surveys. They rely on employee perception without objective productivity measures. My employees — lawyers and staff alike — were also happier when they returned. The social isolation, so unhappily a part of this pandemic, had ended and they were able to joke, remonstrate and develop ideas with their colleagues. Everyone is happier back than they had been in the isolation of their home office.
A recent study by Aternity’s Global Remote Work Productivity Tracker found that Canadians’ level of productivity, or output per hour, when working from home, dropped by 21 per cent.
Women and racialized minorities have also been particularly disadvantaged by remote work. To have their skills recognized and get ahead in workplaces which may be biased against them, they benefit from the increased visibility of their skills, and the close mentoring relationships that are much more prevalent in the physical workplace.
It is not all bad news for employers. As mentioned, some employees are working harder than ever. Others work the same amount but have the inevitable distractions of home life whether it be their children playing, the dog barking, the door ringing or the impulse to take a stroll to collect their thoughts or unwind with a friend. Many parents have no choice but to work from home because of their childcare responsibilities, and they have to be accommodated both legally and societally.
But it should not be surprising that some spend a portion of their days performing more pleasurable tasks than working (and I’m not just referring to Jeffrey Toobin).
After all, if they decide to bake a cake, take a nap, go for a stroll or assist their child with remote learning, as long as they keep their cellphone handy, the employer will never be the wiser. Human nature is such that, if some can spend their workday on matters more engaging than their jobs, knowing that they will never be caught, they will do precisely that. We all know of employees, pre- pandemic, who avoided work or took bogus sick days. It should not be surprising that, now that they are remotely working with the employer having no ability to detect whether they actually are, they will take advantage.
Jonathan Haskel, a member of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, recently told the U. K.- based The Times that the shift towards home working was unlikely to last as most companies had not found it to be productive, even though it led to many people working longer hours. He also gave an important warning, one which I have been writing about for months, and the remote- work lobby should be cautious about: Haskel found that the U.K. risks job losses as remote work moves British jobs abroad.
The same applies to Canada. If employees need not come to the office, then why do they need to reside in that local community or even in the country. Companies will find it more profitable to hire the best employee at the lowest salary, wherever they might reside. Highly paid Canadians will lose their jobs to employees from lower-cost countries. What will that do to Canada’s employment and tax base? The remote- working lobby and employees finding they like it should watch what they wish for.
Now, let the hate mail renew. Got a question about employment law during COVID-19? Write to me at levitt@ levittllp. com. Howard Levitt is senior partner of Levitt LLP, employment and labour lawyers. He practises employment law in eight provinces. He is the author of six books including the Law of Dismissal in Canada.