Remote work: When hybrid is the answer to employees’ pain
Hybrid work arrangements can benefit everyone if executed correctly.
The pandemic and its restrictions have largely favored the rise of remote and hybrid work and demonstrated that the suddenness of their implementation has left some employees upset. In fact, in 2020, 26% believed that remote working had a negative impact on their psychological health and a quarter of managers declared that they were unfavorable to remote working.
Related: Workplace in flux: The practicalities of going hybrid
However, when it comes from an informed choice by the company and the employee, hybrid work is by far the best ally for employees, with a positive impact on their mental health. Benefits? More autonomy and flexibility and a better work-life balance, too often undermined by the famous “eat/sleep/subway” triptych. But, with the current hindsight, what are the rules to follow to deploy these new organizational methods in the best conditions?
Betting on the organization and implementation of a hybrid ‘routine’
The implementation of a remote/face-to-face combination must result from a joint decision between top management and employees. If remote working imposes itself too abruptly on the latter, it risks constituting an additional mental load. An effect felt during the various mandatory lockdowns.
If the company then decides to follow a hybrid approach, it is important that the teams can have the opportunity to meet regularly and establish a common routine, mixing virtual and physical meetings: video in “1to1” and per team every week, accessible office/co-working space, or regular formal or informal events. By defining a common dynamic, the company strengthens the social bond, the harmful effects of isolation are mitigated, and exchanges are harmonized.
Imposing a common and healthy framework in terms of timetables and communication
With these new ways of working, it often happens that some employees work more than usual from home to compensate for their absence from the office. But the result is often the opposite of what was expected, and they tend to wear themselves out trying to do the right thing.
To avoid these behaviors that are harmful to their well-being and productivity, specific rules must be set out and shared from the start:
Set regular working hours, outside of which the employee stops working. Once again, this rule makes it possible to install a beneficial routine for the employee and helps to protect his/her personal life (sports activities, social and family life, etc.) and to get rid of this inherent obligation linked to presenteeism.
Respect your peers’ schedules: if this rule may seem obvious, it deserves to be remembered, especially in companies that operate in different time zones. Thus, a question asked cannot give rise to an immediate answer.
State and share communication rules: working from home forces us to over-communicate in writing via certain tools, such as Slack, or email. To avoid disappointments and facilitate understanding between colleagues (who may be of different cultures, nationalities, and do not always practice Shakespeare’s language 100%), and to save everyone time, it is important to share communication rules within the company.
One of them is, for example, the “No Hello Policy”: rather than writing a “Hello” then the continuation of a message, sometimes forgotten in the drafts, it is essential that each message be complete, including the subject and clear objectives.
Take an interest in employee well-being at work
HR teams and managers must carry out regular checks of the state of health of employees: regular one-on-one meetings, satisfaction surveys once or twice a year, informal exchanges… Methods that are both qualitative and quantitative to assess employees’ mental health, and to check that everyone is in tune. Thanks to these regular questions, employees can thus talk about the daily issues they may have. But remember that remote management changes from traditional management and that not everyone understands the issues in the same way. This is why companies can and must carry out in-house training, or even call on external organizations specialized in the field.
It is also important to offer employees a space where they can express themselves in order to increase their sense of belonging. It is indeed often more difficult to assess well-being from a distance and to ensure that employees are 100% integrated into the strategic discussions that concern them. Allowing them to participate in decision-making concerning their team, or even the whole company, is a mark of strong integration.
With hindsight, 86% of employees are now in favor of continuing to work from home. But not under any conditions! If there was one thing to remember, it would be to avoid making sudden changes. A traditional corporate culture cannot switch overnight to a different organizational approach. It is therefore essential to work hand-in-hand to define a clear framework and a common position within this framework, while training on these new practices. And hybrid work seems to be the perfect compromise.
Céline Méchain is HR director of Platform.sh and has nearly 20 years of experience in the world of human resources. She joined the company in its early stages and helped it grow from a team of 50 to 230+ employees spread across more than 30 countries.
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