Remote & freelance work are in, return to the office is out

The physical office is over.

While there’s still a lot of push and pull about requiring workers to return to the office - even for a couple of days a week – we’re in the final 5 to 10 years of the need for the physical office just dying out.

We’ve made it through the great experiment of working from home and changing workflows, and we no longer operate how we did pre-COVID. This pace of change isn’t going to slow. We’re only at the beginning of a macro-level impact of what working from home means –  how we measure it, and how we solve the issues that we initially pretended would go away when we went back to the office.

Many large enterprises – including Boeing, IBM, and UPS - are rolling out return-to-office (RTO) mandates in 2024, but the resounding consensus among talent is that “5 days a week in the office is dead.” Sixteen percent of companies worldwide are fully remote, and this number is likely to increase.

Let’s get real, going back to the office will never look like it did before March 2020. The companies trying to go back in time have failed, are failing, or are rethinking their plans. Remote success stories like Glassdoor, Yelp, and others will continue to prove RTO mandates wrong.

A new way forward

The companies that keep forcing the issue are going to lose out. The ones that come out on top will be the ones who gather teams together in person for a week or two every quarter. Or who experiment with various in-person scenarios until they find something that works. There are going to be many folks who will refute this, but others will be in 100% total agreement with me.

The level of flexibility that employees want versus what employers are inclined to provide and at what compensation level is reaching a breaking point. This is one of the great chasms that needs to be crossed for the future of work to evolve. People are looking for a middle ground. They want to be paid well, they want to have a certain level of flexibility, and they want to have some semblance of balance in their lives.

The companies that don’t address these needs do so at their peril. And the ones that do will create the modern enterprise workforce. It’s less of a strategic move and more of a cultural decision that will then decide if a company will be successful or not. Many companies are going to struggle with this because it’s not what they’re used to.

The future is freelance

The growth of the freelance marketplace can no longer be ignored and is expected to reach 76.4 million workers in the U.S. in 2024. This includes freelance, contingent workers, external workforce, influencers, etc.

Not only are companies beginning to think about the workforce differently, but workers are beginning to think about their lives differently. Companies have the opportunity to move to increasing numbers of freelance and contingent workers. Workers can also have more control as freelancers, deciding where they work, when they work, and how they will do it. If workers don’t want to return to the office, they’ll resign and go freelance and have the opportunity to make just as much, if not more money, as a full-timer, and on their terms.

The backlash against companies mandating in-office work has sparked a crucial conversation. Here are three key ways companies and their employees reap the rewards of remote-first and flexibility-first practices.

How flexibility-first companies are reaping the rewards

1. Employee retention becomes a paramount consideration.The costs associated with hiring and onboarding replacements can be staggering. By granting employees flexibility over their work location and day, companies foster an environment that encourages loyalty and reduces attrition rates, ultimately safeguarding their investments in human capital. Fifty-seven percent of remote employees say they will look for a new job if they can’t continue working remotely.
2. Flexibility opens doors to an expanded talent pool.The ability to tap into workers without geographical barriers alleviates the challenges of sourcing talent in highly competitive job markets and locations. Companies gain access to a diverse range of skills and expertise, enhancing their ability to thrive in today’s dynamic business landscape. Sixty-three percent of the employees who say their jobs can be done remotely expect their employers to offer a mix of remote and in-person work over the next year.
3. Prioritizing flexibility cultivates a happier and more inspired workforce.A healthy work-life integration empowers employees to bring their best selves to work. This sense of equilibrium boosts creativity, motivation, and overall job satisfaction, resulting in a more engaged and productive workforce. The Future Forum Pulse survey found that 53% of employees who were unhappy with their amount of flexibility at work experience burnout. In contrast, 37% of employees said they were satisfied with their flexibility but still experienced burnout.

Related: Remote work roles dropped 25% since 2021, employees pushing RTO mandates

Companies don’t exhibit the same amount of loyalty to employees that they did 40 or 50 years ago – that’s a real thing. Yet some employers are shocked when employees don’t exhibit loyalty to them. If a company doesn’t offer the pay and flexibility that employees need, employees will leave for a company that does. That’s just how it is.

Employers need to start thinking about their behavior and consider what side of history they want to come down on. They have to decide if they are going to be the company that embraces the future or not. Are they really going to make everybody come back to the office? Go back to the 40-hour work week? Be utterly inflexible to the point they lose their best workers? If so, that’s the antithesis of future-proofing an organization. It’s time for the workplace to grow up and move forward.

Dave Colford is the CCO of Worksuite, the premier SaaS and professional services company focused on global freelancer, contingent, and influencer workforces. As an industry leader, Colford has been at the vanguard of enterprise-level digital transformations, management turnarounds, and ongoing value creation for over 25 years.