Perspectives on Working from Home survey insights
April 2020
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CONTENTS 01
INTRODUCTION
02
ORGANISATIONAL DATA
03
PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING
04
CURRENT SCENARIO
05
FUTURE SCENARIO
06
ADDITIONAL SURVEY COMMENTS
07
CONCLUSION
08
ADDITIONAL INSIGHTS
2
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
No sooner had the government-enforced lock-down begun when the first of the surveys started landing in our inbox. What was immediately apparent was that the focus of many of them was on the here and now with no request for context and questions were primarily aimed at an individual level. If the past few weeks of working from home has taught us anything it is that individuals are incredibly resourceful and resilient. You only have to look at the number of monitors piled on top of books or boxes to see that people are adapting as best they can. SPACE work with organisations going through periods of change and thus it was important for us to ask questions regarding the standing of organisations prior to the lock-down. In our blogs and thought pieces over the years we have discussed opportunities to improve the workplace, both physically and in terms of policies, and there were very promising signs that progress was being made with some organisations, including those in traditionally conservative sectors, challenging the way they were currently working. This artificial working from home scenario is proving to be a challenge for the very reason that the situation is not in our control. The fact that schools are closed places an extra burden on those with school age children.
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INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
It is clear that the data will be skewed to a certain degree but we felt that there was merit in asking the questions at an organisational level, to understand where we've come from in such a short period of time and also to gain a better understanding of what the future might hold. In the short term (pre-vaccine phase) there is likely to be an adapted form of ‘where we were’, but the hope is that experience gained from the present will be put to good use and tackle many of the workplace issues that were talked about by so many but were changed by so few. The focus of the survey was on the organisation more than the individual. Whilst individuals have generally been able to be respond to changing circumstances, the pandemic has forced change at an organisational level at very short notice. Our aim to was to discover levels of readiness, adaptability and whether our clients felt they would do things differently in future.
REPORT AUTHORS
Chris Carr,
Phil Muir,
Senior Workplace Consultant
Director of Consultancy & Design
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ORGANISATIONAL DATA
ORGANISATIONAL DATA
ORGANISATIONAL DATA - Sector breakdown The breakdown of 104 responses by sector below, is indicative of where the majority of our current clients are based, though the small number of responses within the Retail / Leisure / Hospitality sector is perhaps an indicator of just how significantly this sector has been impacted recently with many staff being furloughed. Within the ‘Other’ category are several responses from within Construction, another sector hit badly by the current Coronavirus outbreak, and several from ‘Public Policy / Networking’ organisations. (Public) Central Government / Local Government / NDPB
11% 4%
(Public) Education / Health (Public) Housing Association
3% 11%
(Private) Legal / Finance
26%
(Private) Energy / Technology (Private) Retail / Leisure / Hospitality
2% 6%
(Private) Manufacturing / Industrial
24%
(Private) Professional Services Third Sector Other
SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
1% 13%
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ORGANISATIONAL DATA
ORGANISATIONAL DATA - Headcount breakdown The responses contained within this survey correspond to organisations with a total workforce well in excess of 10,000 staff and represent a range from micro-enterprises to much larger organisations. Of the organisations with 500+ employees, 4 were in the Legal / Finance sector, 2 in Professional Services, 2 in Energy / Technology and 1 in Construction (all Private Sector). From the Public Sector, 5 organisations were in the ‘Government’ sector, 2 were in the Education / Health sector and there was 1 Housing Association. In terms of how organisations characterised their working environments, at one extreme, some reported no assigned desks for all staff with, we imagine, different degrees of desk-sharing. These organisations range from the microenterprises with fewer than 25 staff all the way to the other end of the scale, and are in both the public and private sector. At the opposite end of the space use strategy spectrum, one organisation with between 25 and 100 staff have no open plan areas, though we would imagine that not all cellular space is single-person offices. In excess of 70% of responses suggest a high degree of desk ownership.
28%
Less than 25 25%
25-100 100-200 200-500 More than 500
13% 17% 16%
Other
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PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING In order to understand the degree of change you recently had to go through, we felt that it was important to capture your ‘starting position’. Staff within SPACE made frequent use of our flexible working policy and technology support, but take-up of regular working from home was very limited.
PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING
PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING - Current space use strategy At one extreme, some organisations reported no assigned desks for staff with, we imagine, different degrees of desksharing. These organisations range from the micro-enterprises with fewer than 25 staff all the way to the other end of the scale, and are in both the public and private sector. At the opposite end of the space use strategy spectrum, one organisation (in the ‘other’ category) with between 25 and 100 staff have no open plan areas, though we would imagine that not all cellular space is single-person offices. The ‘Other’ category also included several organisations working out of serviced offices. In excess of 70% of responses would suggest a high degree of desk ownership.
9%
All open plan – no assigned desks) All open plan – assigned desks
32%
Predominantly open plan – managers in offices
44% 10%
Predominantly cellular – pockets of open plan Other
SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
4%
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PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING
PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING - Flexible working policy In relation to staff working from home, did your organisation have a formal, written Flexible Working Policy that all staff were aware of?
Yes
40%
No
Don’t know
54%
6%
As the workplace has changed and staff demographics have changed to better reflect wider society, expectations of more flexible work policies have increasingly become the norm. Through working with organisations large and small, public, private and third sector in developing new workplace strategies, one of the most common shortcomings that SPACE have encountered is not that no written Flexible Working Policy (FWP) exists, but that its implementation is not consistent across an organisation, often dictated by a line manager’s own experiences and expectations.
SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
To ensure a consistent and advantageous approach to flexible working policy we believe that organisations should: Have an up to date FWP (and this may be that, for perfectly legitimate operational reasons, regular working from home is not an option for some job roles). Ensure that line managers are implementing this policy in a fair and consistent manner. Ensure that all staff (not just new hires during induction) are aware of the policy and what process needs to be followed to request a change in working pattern (whether regular or not).
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PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING
PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING - Working from home Pre pandemic, how common was working from home?
44%
Very rarely used by staff
Used on a regular basis by a number of staff (e.g. 1- or 2-days per week)
Used on an ad hoc basis by a number of staff
Taken in conjunction with the responses to the previous question, it would appear that awareness of, and participation in, working from home is not that widespread.
28%
28%
As we potentially see a move to more regular working from home, workplace protocols such as clear desks and the provision of staff lockers in to the workplace will require to be addressed.
The ad hoc use of working from home probably takes into account instances when those frequent work life challenges necessitate a few hours out of the office. An interesting follow-up question (given that percentage of organisations who operate on an assigned desk strategy) would be whether the staff who are working from home clear their desks and make them available for visiting colleagues.
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PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING
PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING - Working from home What percentage of staff regularly worked from home for at least 1 day per week?
61%
19% 6%
2%
3%
1%
1%
5%
0%
1%
0-10% 10-20% 20-30% 30-40% 40-50% 50-60% 60-70% 70-80% 80-90% 90-100% Percentage of staff routinely working from home pre-Covid-19
With just over 10% of the organisations indicating that noone worked from home for at least 1 day per week and with the average percentage of staff working from home at some point during the week being only 17%, it is clear that this work policy is not popular (for a range of reasons). Reasons for this low uptake in working from home are most likely to be a combination of a low number of staff requests and operational requirements making this not an option. As referred to earlier, while the implementation of new ways of working has changed the mantra from ‘command and control’ to ‘support and trust’, issues of supervision and trust are often the main reasons why working from home was not so prevalent.
SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
For the former, staff are less likely to request permission to work from home if: they have a poor home working environment they are very client facing they need access to custom technology or a range of samples they wish to keep work and life separate Working from home might not be an option for employees in jobs where: access to sensitive or confidential data is required ad hoc collaboration is an integral part of their job success.
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PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING
PRE-PANDEMIC BENCHMARKING - Organisational readiness
35%
20%
10% 7% 3%
3%
4%
4%
5%
7%
0-10% 10-20% 20-30% 30-40% 40-50% 50-60% 60-70% 70-80% 80-90% 90-100% Perception of organisational ‘readiness’ for working from home
As the price of mobile technology (e.g. laptops and tablets) has come down, many organisations saw this as the opportunity to implement a ‘laptop first’ computer replacement programme. This increase in the use of mobile technology supported the employee to be more mobile when working externally with clients, but also freed them from their desk and made the entire workplace available to them. For some organisations however the laptop was simply a replacement for the desktop and in those cases where mobility was seldom required, the technology was not critical to their job role. The previous responses indicate that working from home was not taken up by many staff in most organisations. The ability to quickly transition staff from SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
primarily working in the office to working from home, as can be seen in the responses was seemingly ‘relatively painless’ with most organisations reporting that they were quite well prepared for this enforced lock-down. A significant number of organisations (almost 25%) scored themselves at 100 and these were in both the public and private sector, with a range of space use strategies and had staff headcounts that encompassed small to large organisations. Similarly, of the organisations who responded as being ‘unprepared’ for supporting mobile working (rating themselves below 10%), there was nothing in common with them in terms of size, space use strategy or sector. 14
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CURRENT SCENARIO The current situation is abnormal in that people are not working from home by choice, but as directed by the government. SPACE staff have experienced the same challenges as all other organisations but have similarly found that many projects were able to continue, and clients were by and large happy to engage virtually.
CURRENT SCENARIO
CURRENT SCENARIO - Now working from home
67%
2%
3%
2%
5%
8% 1%
1%
2%
7%
0-10% 10-20% 20-30% 30-40% 40-50% 50-60% 60-70% 70-80% 80-90% 90-100% Percentage of staff currently working from home
Within the space of less than 1 month from the government requesting that all staff who could work from home to do so and this survey being released, the situation changed from approximately 10% of the organisations indicating that no-one routinely worked from home to 55% of organisations reporting that over 95% of staff were now working from home.
The devil may be in the detail for those organisations where there are a significant percentage of staff not currently working from home. These could be a combination of roles that are not supported by home working, or some organisations where a skeleton staff are required to be permanently on site for security / business continuity reasons.
This is a remarkable transformation in the way people are now working, and this change is one which, for many of the organisations SPACE have been in contact with, happened within just a few days.
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CURRENT SCENARIO
CURRENT SCENARIO - The impact of working from home on performance
32%
morale and motivation the sense of community
49%
13%
productivity 6%
24%
36%
55%
significant negative effect noticeable negative effect no noticeable effect
It is clear from the responses that the two statements with the most negative responses (a combination of ‘significant negative’ and ‘noticeable negative’ effect) are those where a physical setting has a very direct (real or perceived) input, i.e. in helping to foster a workplace community and in supporting face-to-face interactions with clients. For both of these, the workplace plays a vital role (and most likely will continue to do so as part of a digital / physical solution). The responses to ‘morale and motivation’ suggest that the effect of working from home has been minimally negative on average. It would be interesting to monitor the aggregated ‘morale’ responses from individual staff as a function of time, since there is some anecdotal evidence of staff behaviours changing akin to the Kubler-Ross 5 ‘Stages of Grief’ Model.
26% 29%
40%
29%
SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
15%
22%
32%
the ability to collaborate the ability to interact with clients
52%
13%
5%
7%
noticeable positive effect significant positive effect N/A
The relative ease of virtual collaboration technology has been a revelation for staff who were used to briefly chatting to colleagues within the workplace as the simplest form of collaboration. This rapid adaptation has undoubtedly had an impact on the responses. The fact that more than half of the responses have indicated no noticeable change in ‘productivity’ is interesting given the context of general increased uncertainty and, for some, a drop in workload as projects are temporarily halted. This overall response has to be seen as a positive and could be used to counter the oft-heard argument that staff working from home (without physical supervision) are not as productive as those sitting in the workplace (the very definition of presenteeism).
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CURRENT SCENARIO
CURRENT SCENARIO - Collaboration technology Which technologies does your organisation use internally to keep in touch with colleagues?
Which technologies do you use to keep in touch with external customers / clients?
95%
99%
91%
Telephone
95%
78%
Microsoft Teams
63%
57%
Skype for Business
49%
32%
Zoom
37%
3%
Slack
1%
17%
Other
8%
Other: Internal social media, Yammer / WhatsApp, text, VMR, Facetime, Staff Intranet, Webex, Go to meeting.
Other: Vscene, LinkedIn, Software for healthcare interactions with patients, Facetime, WhatsApp, Go to meeting, Blue Jeans .
As stated previously, the ease with which remote teams have been able to collaborate using technology such as Microsoft Teams possibly highlights just how little the standard Microsoft Office applications were being used to best effect within the ‘normal’ workplace. It will be interesting to see whether people return to their old ways of collaborating when workplaces are open again or whether virtual collaboration is here to stay.
The fact that the use of Teams drops slightly when dealing with external customers or clients is potentially affected by the ongoing debate of ‘video / no video’ in virtual meetings. It is clear that for regular interaction with well-known clients video meetings are not an issue, but for initial new client introductions there might be some reluctance to use video from the outset and instead opt for e-mail or telephone contact until there is a level of familiarity.
With Microsoft Outlook having Skype and Teams meeting invites in their standard Calendar set-ups, it is interesting to see that Skype lags so far behind Teams; is Skype already yesterday’s child? Early concerns over security issues with Zoom may have had a bearing on its low takeup. SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
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CURRENT SCENARIO
CURRENT SCENARIO - Benefits of working from home (for the individual) 84%
Ability to perform focused work w/out office-based distractions 15%
Ability to hold confidential phone-calls Increased productivity
20%
Ability to cope better with work / life challenges
63%
Reduction in commuting time / financial savings
82%
Having a positive environmental impact Comments
With ‘Ability to perform focused work without office-based distractions’ and ‘Reduction in commuting time / financial savings’ rating so highly, it is clear that people just want to get on with their work. Focused work that is desk-based is the most important workplace activity according to data collated by Leesman1, so it is understandable that it ranks highest in the responses. The low percentage for ‘Ability to hold confidential phonecalls’ perhaps challenges the myth surrounding the need by many senior managers for owned offices, though there is still a requirement to provide some private, enclosed, shared spaces for phone-calls – as evident by the high response to ‘Ability to cope better with work / life challenges’ some of which will likely be private phonecalls. 1. https://www.leesmanindex.com/wpcontent/uploads/2020/04/LeesmanInsights-Book-SP-2019-Digital.pdf 2. https://workplaceinsight.net/an-optimistic-take-on-the-future-of-work/ SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
36% 1%
To keep the number of different options to a manageable level, the ‘Reduction in commuting time’ and ‘Financial savings’ were combined. With ‘Having a positive environmental impact’ scoring relatively low, it would be interesting to know which of the two issues (Commuting or Finances) contributed most to the high response rate for ‘Reduction in commuting time / financial savings’. The response to ‘Increased productivity’ needs to be seen in relation to the ‘Ability to perform focused work without office-based distractions’ as the responses seem to be somewhat contradictory. With individual focused work tending to take up a significant percentage of our typical working day (anywhere between 30-80%2), it would be expected that working from home should lead to increased productivity. Again, perhaps this response is being influenced by the current abnormal working from home set-up. 19
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CURRENT SCENARIO
CURRENT SCENARIO - Disadvantages of working from home (for the individual) 52%
Access to an ergonomic workstation and office technology
54%
Access to colleagues for collaboration Disconnect from the wider organisation
71%
Drop in motivation
30%
Access to clients for face-to-face meetings
61%
Decreased productivity due to work / life challenges Comments
While the ‘benefits’ of working from home for the individual had clear ‘winners’, the ‘disadvantages’ for the individual are somewhat more bunched. As mentioned in the ‘Perspective on Performance’ question on page 14, many of the disadvantages of working from home are those related to the separation from the physical workplace. The top ranking of ‘Disconnect from the wider organisation’ shows that people still regard the workplace as the heart of the organisation and a place where they want to be. It may be that, in future, working in the office is less the default but more for collaborative endeavours rather than individual tasks.
25% 7%
It is clear from the response to the first statement and to the recent report by the Institute of Employment Studies, UK1 on the increase in musculoskeletal complaints, that increased working from home should go hand-in-hand with an increased investment (either by the individual or the organisation) in appropriate home office equipment. The low percentage for the decrease in productivity may be indicative of the abnormal circumstances with childcare and poor connectivity due to demand on bandwidth.
1. https://www.employmentstudies.co.uk/sites/default/files/resources/summarypdfs/IES%2 0Homeworker%20Wellbeing%20Survey%20%20Interim%20Findings.pdf SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
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FUTURE SCENARIO It is not clear what change will result from this enforced period of working from home. Every organisation will react differently to the challenges we are all facing. The number of opinion pieces and articles in the popular media would suggest that there is an expectation that the future workplace will not be a simple return to the pre-Covid-19 days.
FUTURE SCENARIO
FUTURE SCENARIO - Impact of this period of enforced working from home Will this experience of working from home influence your organisation's ... Flexible Working Policy?
72%
approach to mobile technology?
73%
understanding of what the function of the office will be?
61%
future levels of interaction and collaboration?
61%
What is clear from the responses is that following the easing of the lock-down and the gradual return to the workplace, all organisations will begin adapting to their own version of normality and most will be influenced by the current working from home experience. Those statements with the highest ‘Yes’ responses are for those that are, to a certain extent, tangible, e.g. a new Flexible Working Policy is something that HR can very quickly put together. Increasing the uptake of virtual client meetings is something that was slowly happening before the lock-down, before it was forced upon the nation. The higher percentage of ‘No’ responses for mobile technology might be an indicator of organisations either
SPACE SURVEY – PERSPECTIVES ON THE FUTURE WORKPLACE
11 % 6%
2`% 90%
approach to hosting / attending virtual meetings?
approach to a phased return to work (staff rotate between home and office to allow for continued physical distancing)?
17%
15% 26% 13%
66% Yes
7% 2%
No
24% 13% 21%
Don’t know
having already made that investment or perhaps not feeling confident that the investment and the need is there at this time. Similarly, 26% of responses indicating that ‘future levels of interaction and collaboration’ will not be influenced by the current experience is potentially implying that ways of working within certain organisations are impervious to such disruptions as the coronavirus pandemic. What the future office will look like is to some extent an irrelevance; how it functions is far more important. Since we are very much veering into unknown territory here, the high percentage of ‘Don’t know’ responses is perhaps understandable.
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ADDITIONAL SURVEY COMMENTS
ADDITIONAL SURVEY COMMENTS
ADDITIONAL SURVEY COMMENTS - Impact of this period of enforced working from home
As is common in our workplace transformation projects, the free text comments have been summarised and split into the three main themes of: people and policies access to technology the physical workspace PEOPLE AND POLICIES The current experience will definitely lead to a greater formalising of working from home policies. With less face-to-face contact expected in the future, the importance of connecting with remote staff will be clear. The office is not dead, however; it will still be the place for interaction with colleagues and it has to be remembered that working from home is not for everyone, there has to be some choice in the matter. TECHNOLOGY Just as the home workspace will need to be ergonomically comfortable, the digital technology will require to as closely as possible replicate the office environment, with practical considerations such as high-speed connectivity and single or dual monitors replacing laptops. An unintended benefit of virtual collaboration technology may be the streamlining of all meetings in the future, with a greater efficiency currently being noted in online meetings. THE PHYSICAL WORKSPACE The importance of a dedicated workspace that is comfortable was mentioned (backing up the Leesman data) but the most noteworthy comments were regarding the long-term requirements for office space and how the increase in working from home will have a knock-on effect on the office space required for desks. As one of the respondents commented, “Probably too early to give definitive answers. Once this is all over, we will be better placed to comment.” The responses we have collated are a snapshot in time and both attitudes and experiences will change.
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CONCLUSION
In order to understand the degree of change you recently had to go through, we felt that it was important to capture your ‘starting position’. Staff within SPACE made frequent use of our flexible working policy and technology support, but take-up of regular working from home was very limited.
CONCLUSION
CONCLUSIONS With no definitive back to work schedule outlined by the government, it is clear that for there to be a COVID-19 ‘pre-vaccine’ return to the workplace, organisations will have to consider how they can safely return whilst maintaining physical distancing recommendations. Some of our early studies on existing client offices show that the effect of physical distancing will reduce effective number of usable desks to as little as 25% of the total. If this is the case, it is clear that an element of working from home will require to continue in the short term. In the longer term, the post-vaccine phase, there is evidence from the survey responses that the workplace landscape will be very different from the one we shut down in March 2020. With previous utilisation studies showing offices at an average of 45% utilisation and the current situation showing that technology allows us to largely work effectively from home, is this the evidence we need to design the future workplace less around individual tasks and more around collaboration and organisational identity?
Thank you to all participants of the survey. If you have any questions, please contact: Phil Muir: philip.muir@spacesolutions.co.uk Chris Carr: chris.carr@spacesolutions.co.uk
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ABERDEEN DUNDEE EDINBURGH GLASGOW LONDON MANCHESTER e: philip.muir@spacesolutions.co.uk w: www.spacesolutions.co.uk