Last week my company announced a trial to get employees together more in person in an office, with the aim of getting staff collaborating and innovating. This comes on the back of the energy created at the company's recent Annual Kick-Off (AKO) event in California, attended in person by several hundred staff mainly involved in revenue creation. The three day high energy event is designed to ensure all staff, particularly those involved in sales, are aligned with the company's strategic priorities and how to achieve the company's goals.
The trial runs for three months with all staff not classed as remote expected to participate. They are expected to either work in an office one day every week, four consecutive days once a month, or two consecutive days twice a month. Employees are not classed as remote if they live within 50 miles of one of the company offices.
This is a good idea for some, but not for others. The company is very focused on sales as it runs headlong to becoming profitable, and the owners have a strong track record of success when it comes to taking start-ups to the next level. The problem is that the one size fits all solution just doesn't work. I can see how teams in the same location can collaborate and innovate, but what about teams that don't have that luxury? Further, I question why it isn't possible to collaborate and innovate remotely?
I had this very conversation last weekend with an architect friend of mine. His company requires all staff to be in onsite five days a week. He sees the benefit of this and disagreed when I suggested the benefits could also be achieved if people worked remotely. He cited having to look over and discuss large drawings with his team. Apparently, it is only possible in person in an office environment. Who knew!
I know I'm lucky to work in the technology sector, but his attitude rankled with me. I admit that not everyone can or would want to work remotely, but the last three years of this pandemic have shown us it is 100% possible. All it needs is an investment in staff and infrastructure.
There lays the real nub of the issue. It costs money to invest in IT, software, and staff training. I totally get that, but this should be the norm. Defending the idea of forcing staff to attend in person approaches the problem from the wrong angle. With the right equipment and can do attitude it is absolutely possible to collaborate from anywhere with a secure wifi connection.
Take my team. It is spread across three continents, four countries, and seven offices. It is almost impossible to have everyone together in the same location at the same time. Even when online, we only have a two hour window when most of us can meet. This makes online sessions a necessity, and even then we have to ignore our staff in the Far East.
What I fundamentally disapprove of with this trial, is the insinuation that my team aren't already collaborating and innovating whilst working remotely. Whilst it may be the case that not all teams are, I can prove just how collaborative and innovative we are. My team's role is not limited to one department. It covers the entire company, so collaboration and innovation aren't so much an aspiration as an absolute necessity.
So I've made the decision to change my contract to being located remotely. I may live only 15 miles from our nearest office, but the three hours daily I'd spend commuting to it could be better spent. Plus as I'm the only member of my team in that location, I can't collaborate in person unless there was a massive travel budget and a willingness from staff to congregate in one of our offices on a regular basis. As neither of those is going to happen, I'm not going to commute to an office just to attend an online session. I can do that from the comfort of my home office.
I've unofficially worked remotely full time for over three years. Even before the pandemic, I worked remotely at least one day a week for many years. As I approach retirement I've come to appreciate the flexibility remote working has offered me, and I don't want to give that up now.
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