The Permanent WFH Bandwagon
I started writing this blog post in May, when I read a series of tweets from Shopify on them becoming a digital by default company.
As a tech start-up, we were born as WFH, or anywhere. We had gone through a few transitions, from occasional coffee shop meetings, to a Flexday membership, to infrequent Breather meeting room rentals, to finally having our own little office at the Staples Studio—that felt like progress.
However, we never used our office five days a week. We were usually there two days a week, which felt wasteful but we just couldn’t give up the flexibility of WFH. For us, work didn’t always happen in the office; Mos Mos coffee happened in the office (along with ping pong, Rolltation bowls, the Escape Room, meditation, etc.), blended with good white board time that resulted in more Jira cards to be implemented in our WFH setup. Like Shopify, our office has always acted as “an on-ramp to our digital workspace.”
The benefits of WFH are something we can attest to from experience: not having to default to proximity meant we could source the best talent, not the closest talent. Of course, there are some humorous hiccups. For example: in a recent team hangout on Zoom, we each told 3 “factoids” for others to guess if they were true or false. Our NLP Engineer, who had been hired on remotely, threw us this: “I am very tall”. Despite working together for an entire year, we had to guess at all! The fact that we were able to bring them onboard the team though—and get to know them in more substantial ways--outweighs that collateral by far.
This may all sound very cool. The truth is, it didn’t always feel that cool. I have to confess that I had never stopped thinking whether WFH by default was the right thing to do. If we were in-office by default, could there be more creative juices? Could it be more fun and motivating for the team? Could we be taken more seriously by new hires, clients, funders, etc.? While WFH might have been the ultimate perk for large companies, for us it felt awkward more often than not pre-pandemic.
Then the pandemic hit. Many people, if their work allowed, were asked to WFH during the lock-down. One after another, large tech companies started announcing permanent WFH even after the lock-down.
Which—wow. I never thought we were future-proof. Is permanent WFH the next new big thing? What is this massive WFH experiment going to tell companies and employees?
From May to July, we chatted with approximately 800 Canadians and Americans using inca, our qualitative-first insight platform for understanding people in-depth and at-scale, to understand their thoughts on WFH.
In May, 85% of those whose work allowed them to WFH said they liked remote work. I was, however, immediately drawn to the minority, the 15% who said they didn’t, and reasons they shared.
That 15% in May (and 12% in June) grew into 22% in July: more people disliked working from home as they spent more time doing so.
Why did they not like WFH, while the majority seemed to embrace it?
The most commonly cited reason has consistently been the lack of human interaction, which rose from 27% in May (and 29% in June) to 48% in July (percentages are automatically coded from reasons volunteered by participants; directional based on small sample sizes).
I would prefer going out, as meeting with people and colleagues physically helps one to grow socially.
Others have concerns about productivity: In May 21% of the participants mentioned low productivity as a reason for disliking WFH. That became a much more common concern in June (45%) but the popularity came down to 36% in July. That’s an interesting change, possibly a reflection on people adjusting to the new norm.
Productivity goes down when people aren't together. There is an advantage for minds to work together.
Meanwhile, mental health concerns grew from 5% in May to 25% in June and 21% in July.
WFH has made me very stressed when I want to go out.
Regardless of the WFH situation, many of us are feeling that Covid anxiety—and we’ll likely continue to experience that into the next year, with a second wave coming (or already happening, depending on where you’re located). With this new normal continuing, it becomes imperative that companies—if they haven’t already—need to design a new workplace experience for their employees. We share our reflections and findings on WFH in hopes of helping companies do that.
I wanted to focus on the minorities, because as extreme users or edge cases, according to design thinking, their needs may very well be amplified versions of our common needs. Hearing the minority voices will help us design better experiences for us all, and make us a better society after all.
The WFH benefits exist, but for them to be properly implemented, reactive band-aid solutions to the pandemic can be improved upon. And who knows? Maybe they’ll be here to stay.
Are you ready to jump on the permanent WFH bandwagon?
Methodology:
Nexxt Intelligence conducted a total of 800 one-on-one interviews using inca, our qualitative-first insight platform for understanding people in-depth and at-scale through engaging research conversations and custom NLP. Insights included in this post are based on three studies conducted in May, June and July 2020 (approximately 50:50 split between Canadians and Americans for each study):
Study One: N=206, May 18th – 20th
Study Two: N=286, June 6th – 8th