miss the mark
– chybić, nie zdołać
osiągnąć czegoś
in the foreseeable
future
– w najbliższej/
przewidywalnej
przyszłości
BUSINESS
The truth
about
hybrid work
It’s changing the nature of work
and management in surprising
ways and rippling through the
economy and much of society.
BY
54
DAV I D H . F R EE DMAN
A
lot of headlines have been
screaming lately that America’s honeymoon with remote work is over. “Bosses
mean it this time: Return to
the office or get a new job!”
says The Washington Post.
“Even Zoom Is Making People Return to the Office,” says The New York Times.
These articles cite some heavy-hitting organizations that are evidently ordering employees back
to work, including Google, Meta, Amazon, the federal government and, yes, even video-conferencing
giant Zoom. “The pandemic is over. Excuses for allowing offices to sit empty should end, too,” wrote Michael Bloomberg, former New York City mayor and
co-founder of the news publisher Bloomberg, in The
Washington Post.
These pronouncements miss the mark. The evidence suggests that the full-time office workweek is
unlikely to return to most organizations any time in
the foreseeable future. What may have started as
FOT. CRAIG F. WALKER/THE BOSTON GLOBE VIA GETTY IMAGES
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
Newsweek Learning English
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
054-058_NLE hybrid work. po kor ELindd.indd 54
22.10.2023 13:52
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
C1
a pandemic-era dalliance has become, in only a few
short years, deeply embedded in America’s workstyle.
But there’s a catch. Most companies, and even
most employees, aren’t crazy about working fulltime from a home office. Instead, companies in the
U.S. and elsewhere seem to be settling on a hybrid
arrangement, in which employees split their work
hours between remote and office-based work. Employees have made up their minds that they want the
option of working remotely for part of the week, and
companies are adapting to making the hybrid workplace a permanent feature.
The evidence shows that companies are starting to
embrace a hybrid workplace. According to Best Practice Institute, Newsweek’s partner in its Most Loved
Workplaces® rankings, 56 percent of companies
across a wide range of industries have adopted a hybrid work environment, while only 28 percent rely
mostly on in-person contact—primarily those companies in healthcare, hospitality and other industries
where customers themselves are usually physically
present. “Trends vary across industries and regions,”
says Best Practice CEO Louis Carter, “but the data
show that hybrid work is the prevailing trend.”
The transition from five days a week in the office
to flexible, hybrid arrangements has not been problem-free. Organizations are having to work out the
new policies and management techniques that can
make hybrid work work. That includes a new emphasis on flexibility in striking a balance between the
needs of each employee, each team and the company
at a large. Companies are starting to see the office not
so much as a place for individuals to get work done as
a hub of interaction.
“How people are managed matters much more
than where and when people are working,” says Jim
Harter, a psychologist and chief scientist of workplace management and wellbeing for analytics and
consulting firm Gallup
The results of the shift to hybrid work are changing the nature of work and management in surprising ways, big and small, and are rippling through
the economy and much of society.
What Return to Office?
In spite of all the talk about returning to the office,
it’s not happening much in real life, according to data
gathered by Nicholas Bloom, a Stanford University economist who has been tracking work-fromhome trends for several years. In January, a little less
than a third of U.S. employees were working remotely more or less full-time, and half were working a hybrid scheduling, combining remote work with time
at a physical workplace. Today it’s the same. “The
levels have been flat as a pancake,” says Bloom. The
numbers of people working from home rose dramat-
Newsweek
LearningEnglish
ically from a mere 5 percent when the pandemic hit
and haven’t changed much in two years.
The trend toward more working from home has
been building for decades, says Bloom, doubling every 15 years. The pandemic increased levels by a factor
of six, rocketing the trend 40 years into the future.
Now only a fifth of U.S. employees work in an office
full-time.
Despite the headlines, few companies are trying to
buck that trend. Google, Meta and Zoom aren’t actually forcing employees to go back to the full-time inthe-office policy that was the norm pre-pandemic. In
fact, they and other big companies pushing for the end
of fully remote work are asking for employees to work
part-time in the office, in most cases three days a week,
and even then not necessarily for full 9-to-5 days.
The federal government is being flexible, too, despite several pronouncements from President Joe
Biden about the need to get federal employees back
into offices. Across Washington government offices
occupancy rates were averaging about 20 percent
toward the end of the pandemic, and there’s little evidence much has changed. The Federal Aviation Administration has reportedly asked employees to work
in the office three days a week, and there’s no sign that
other agencies are asking more than that. “These sorts
of policies seem very reasonable,” says Bloom.
Why are employers insisting on even a part-time
return to the office? One reason has to do with concerns over productivity. Over the past two years the
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics registered the steepest two-year decline in white-collar productivity in
the 75 years for which it has data. A Microsoft survey
of business leaders found that 85 percent of them
have less confidence in the productivity of their employees when they do some of their work remotely.
Perhaps they have some reason to be worried. Attendance at golf courses is up 52 percent—with almost all the gain coming on weekdays, according to
Stanford data. “The manager’s lament is, ‚How do
I know my people are really working when they’re
not in the office?’” says Patricia Mokhtarian, a professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology who
studies remote work.
But if productivity is declining, then why have
companies been making oodles of money in recent years? Corporate profits hit record levels in
2022. The mismatch suggests that the productivity
data may be off. Companies haven’t yet fully learned
how to measure productivity in the era of hybrid
work. “It’s hard to quantify white-collar work,” notes
Mokhtarian. “How do you even know if someone
who’s in the office is working productively? Managers should be judging by the quality of the work, not
whether someone seems to be busy.” All that golf
isn’t necessarily coming at the expense of work.
dalliance – flirt,
igraszki
prevailing trend
– dominujący trend
ripple through the
economy – odbijać
się na gospodarce/
rzutować
na kondycję
gospodarki
occupancy rate
– obłożenie
oodles of money
– fura pieniędzy
55
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
054-058_NLE hybrid work. po kor ELindd.indd 55
22.10.2023 13:53
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
Newsweek
LearningEnglish
serendipity
– zdolność do
przypadkowych
odkryć, szczęśliwy
traf
gig job – zlecenie,
fucha
pushback
– negatywna
reakcja na coś
walkoff – nagłe
odejście
(np. z pracy)
boon
– dobrodziejstwo
offset
– zrównoważyć,
skompensować
(np. straty)
get away with
something
– uniknąć kary
za coś
crack down on
remote work
– ograniczać/
powstrzymywać
pracę zdalną
resentment
– gniew, niechęć,
frustracja
C1
A more substantial criticism of remote work is
that it may reduce the sorts of valuable personal interactions that take place in offices. These are hard
to duplicate in Zoom meetings or on Slack threads.
Remote work weakens connections that are important to career advancements, according to a Massachusetts Institute of Technology study. Researchers
from Harvard and other institutions also found evidence that employees who are lower down on the
corporate ladder tend to get less feedback from managers. That’s a real risk with remote work, agrees
Ian Cook, vice president of people analytics at human-resource analytics company Visier. “There is
a serendipity to in-person interaction that you
can’t recreate digitally,” he says. “Systems that support remote collaboration haven’t caught up yet.”
Another risk is that remote employees can start to
feel disconnected from the company and its mission,
says Harter. “People can drift away from the purpose
of the organization,” he says. “Over time it can create
a mental distance that makes the job feel more like
a gig job, and employees aren’t as likely to put in the
effort to help out colleagues and customers.”
Also contributing to the push to get people to the
office are the enormous vacancy rates among office
buildings, especially those in cities. According to the
National Association of Realtors, the office vacancy
rate hit a record 13.5 percent by the end of July, with
Commercial Edge reporting vacancy rates topping
20 percent in major markets like Houston, Seattle
and San Francisco. Most office leases signed before
the pandemic haven’t expired yet, according real-estate experts, leaving companies stuck with expensive
offices they’re paying for but aren’t using.
Accepting the Hybrid Reality
Whatever the concerns about remote work, employees have made it clear that they want the option. A Gallup poll of workers whose jobs can be
performed remotely was crystal clear: More than 90
percent expect their employers to be flexible about
remote work. That’s why companies that have issued return-to-the-office demands have seen real
pushback. Amazon saw a temporary employee
walkoff, and Apple employees have circulated petitions decrying the company’s new back-to-office
policy.
Survey data reveals that many employees now see
the right to work remotely at least part time as essential. The rate of quitting among workers in engineering, finance and marketing jobs was 35 percent
higher in positions that were fully office-based, according to a Stanford study. Sixty percent of full-time
remote employees say they’re likely to look for a new
job if they were to lose the option of working remotely. Employees said they would pass up as much as an
56
8 percent pay raise in order to keep hybrid working
options, according to one survey.
One big reason is that remote work has been an
enormous boon to family life, notes Bloom. “It’s
good for parents and all of society,” he says. “The
ability to spend some of the working week at home
with kids might help offset some of the huge educational losses from the pandemic.” In addition, a day
spent working at home is a day that cuts out hated commute time. The shift to remote and hybrid
work, he says, has shaved off about 50 billion commuting miles a year. For people with disabilities or
health challenges, or who have childcare or caregiver responsibilities, a chance to do the job at home can
make all the difference.
Sure, some companies can get away with cracking down on remote work. “Big tech companies
that invest heavily in R&D can work better as in-person companies,” says Janel Everly, senior director analyst for the consulting company Gartner. “And they
can demand that employees come back to the office
because plenty of employees want to work for them.”
But most companies will need to adapt to employees’ preference for hybrid options. “During the
pandemic, when everyone was working remotely,
employees discovered the value of having that autonomy,” says Gallup’s Harter. “Freedom is hard to
take away from people once they’ve had a taste of it.
Now requiring people to work in the office can lead to
lower levels of engagement, higher burnout and a lot
of resentment.”
Besides, most employees seem to be doing their
jobs perfectly well in a remote or hybrid environment. A Microsoft study found that remote employees have not only retained the traditional daily
bumps in productivity at 9:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m., but
now are experiencing a new one at 10:00 p.m., apparently getting in a final shot at catching up on work
before heading to bed. Remote workers meet with
colleagues more often, and for longer periods, than
their counterparts in the office, according to a University of Texas study.
The move to hybrid work seems to be working out.
A PricewaterhouseCoopers survey revealed that 83
percent of employers feel their transition to remote
options has been a success, while a study by Envoy
found that 80 percent of managers who issued return-to-office policies regret it.
But the devil is in the details, say experts. The success of a hybrid environment depends on the policies
an organization adopts and the way managers implement those policies. One policy that won’t work, says
Visier’s Cook, is simply letting all employees work
remotely as much as or whenever they want.
“That can be a recipe for disaster,” he says. “Most
employees are looking to be part of a team in which
Newsweek Learning English
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
054-058_NLE hybrid work. po kor ELindd.indd 56
22.10.2023 13:53
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
The truth about hybrid work
they can accomplish work and get a sense of personal
reward.” That requires a certain amount of structure
in how, when and where people work, he explains.
The key to a successful company policy is to guide
employees toward productive and collaborative behaviors, without forcing them to adhere to a single
set of rigid rules, says Gartner’s Everly. “Organizations that apply a firm but nurturing and trusting
approach are in a good position to really accelerate
their performance right now,” she says. “Organizations that try to push a compliance-driven, do-as-Isay culture on employees are really going to struggle.”
A policy that has worked well so far for many companies, say experts, is one that encourages employees to come into the office two or three days a week
to focus on meetings and mentoring, and that assures employees they will be judged by the results
they produce rather than which days they’re in the
office or which hours they work at home. A key ingredient is communicating to employees the reasons
why a policy is being put into place, contends Hatner.
“It’s important to explain to workers why the policy
will benefit both them and the company,” he says.
Working It Out Team by Team
Because work situations vary so much from employee to employee, a company policy can’t possibly
spell out an at-home and in-the-office routine that
will make sense for every individual. Instead, those
specifics need to be worked out with team managers. Even then, not every employee will thrive in
a hybrid environment, says Mokhtarian. “Trying to
optimize each individual’s performance in that environment is a messy challenge,” she explains. “There
will always be a bit of disequilibrium going on.”
Accepting some of that messiness is essential to
management success in implementing a hybrid policy, argues Cook. “Allowing employees a certain level
of self-management, instead of trying to control for
every employee in every circumstance, works much
better,” he says. “What managers can do is have conversations with their team members about what
work needs to be done, what each person’s contribution to that work should be and what the best way is
to give everyone the in-office social interaction they
need for their work as well as the remote time they
need to focus on their piece of it.”
Because most employees will be spending less time
in the office, managers need to go out of their way to
make sure each one is still getting the feedback they
need to succeed and to feel valued. “Managers should
have at least one meaningful conversation with every
person on their team every single week,” says Hartner. “If they don’t, there’s a risk that the employee will start to feel distanced from the team and the
organization.” Other useful strategies include help-
ing team members coordinate their office days to
ensure maximum overlap for in-person interactions, setting up gatherings and events on occasional
mandatory-attendance days and ensuring that newer employees get the extra in-person attention and
feedback they need to learn the job and advance.
As the hybrid environment matures, offices are
likely to become centers of collaboration rather than
a collection of cubicles and offices for individual
work. They are already starting to physically evolve,
incorporating more open space and meeting points,
with fewer isolated desks. The office kitchen is getting renewed attention, too, as a natural and more
home-like place to congregate.
Even cities and towns are starting to change to reflect the hybrid work environment. “Hybrid work has
implications for residential locations,” says Mokhtarian. “People can’t move far away from the office if they
have to show up there two times a week. But they can
be further away than they were before.” That could
cause a population shift from suburbs to exurbs.
The move away from full-time office work is also
going to impact city centers. When leases expire,
many companies will opt for smaller spaces, or even
leave the city. That could take a toll on some cities, notes Bloom, as they lose tax revenues, and small
businesses that depend on office-worker customers
feel the pinch.
Public transportation could see some withering as
well, as workers opt to drive in two days a week rather than buying a monthly train pass. “They’re going
to see big drops in ridership that will force them to
reduce services,” says Bloom. Cities could convert
commercial space to residential in the hopes of remaking themselves as urban villages, but whether
that would work remains to be seen.
It’s also unclear whether a drop in commuting will
cut carbon emissions. There will be fewer trips, but
they will be longer on average, and fewer will be via
public transportation. Worse, says Mokhtarian, that
minority who become full-time remote workers may
move far from their companies, necessitating that
they fly to offices for occasional visits. “Flying to
headquarters twice a year might produce more carbon emissions than if they commuted every day in
fuel-efficient vehicles,” says Mokhtarian.
Large-scale changes are hard to predict, but it’s
clear the shift to remote work, even if it’s only a few
days a week for most, is likely to have impact far beyond the water cooler on the nation’s economy and
culture. Now that America’s honeymoon with the
40-hour office week is over, the hearts and minds of
corporate executives, and the headlines they inspire,
are bound to follow. NL
rigid rules
– sztywne zasady
thrive – dobrze
się rozwijać,
prosperować
overlap
– częściowe
pokrywanie/
nakładanie się
(np. terminów)
exurb – osiedle
za miastem
(dla bogatych)
take a toll on
something
– niekorzystnie się
na czymś odbijać,
zostawiać na czymś
ślad
feel the pinch
– mieć problemy
finansowe
(szczególnie
z powodu
mniejszych
niż zazwyczaj
dochodów)
NEWSWEEK PODCASTS
Is This the Year
of the Strike?
SCAN & LISTEN!
David H. Freedman
57
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
054-058_NLE hybrid work. po kor ELindd.indd 57
22.10.2023 13:53
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
C1
Task 2
Task 1
Vocabulary ☛ Collocations and verb phrases
Reading
First, match the words to form collocations and
verb phrases that will help you describe the issue
Read the text and answer
the following questions:
1. Why are some companies advocating for a parttime return to the office?
2. According to Best Practice Institute, what
percentage of companies have adopted a hybrid
work environment?
3. How has remote work impacted commuting, as
described in the text?
4. What challenges do companies encounter when
implementing hybrid work policies effectively?
5. Why do some employees hesitate to return to the
office full-time?
6. How have offices changed physically in response
to the hybrid work environment, according to
the text?
7. What potential impacts might the shift to remote
and hybrid work have on city centers?
8. How does the text describe the impact of remote
work on America’s work culture and economy?
presented in the article. Next, write down a sentence using each
collocation and verb phrase. The sentences you create should
relate to the topic being discussed in the text.
Collocations:
pandemic-era
office-based
prevailing
white-collar
in-person
back-to-office
rigid
meaningful
Verb phrases:
order
adopt
work out
create
cut out
crack down on
opt for
cut
Task 3
a mental distance
carbon emissions
a hybrid work environment
smaller spaces
employees back to work
remote work
the new policies
commute time
Task 4
Speaking
Writing ☛ Text summary
Complete the following summary using
Task description: Students will participate
in a discussion about hybrid work.
information from the text.
Task elements:
1. Recall the key points from the text regarding the transition to
hybrid work.
2. Discuss why some companies are pushing for a part-time
return to the office and the concerns they have regarding
remote work’s impact on productivity.
3. Examine the potential advantages and disadvantages of
hybrid work arrangements for employees, companies, and
city centers. Consider the impact on productivity, work-life
balance, and the economy.
4. Create a hybrid work policy for your company. Consider the
number of days employees can work remotely, the criteria
for determining remote work eligibility, and strategies to
maintain a collaborative work environment.
58
policy
trend
rules
dalliance
conversation
work
interaction
productivity
Americans are experiencing a shift in their work habits, with
1) ________ becoming increasingly prevalent. Many companies
are adopting a 2) ________ model, allowing employees to
divide their time between working remotely and in the office.
While some headlines suggest a complete return to 3)
________, data indicates that remote and hybrid work
arrangements are becoming permanent. This change raises
questions about 4) ________ and the value of 5) ________.
Additionally, it has implications for cities, transportation, and
environmental considerations. The move towards remote and
hybrid work is reshaping not only work culture but also
broader societal trends.
Check the answer key!
FOT. BORTONIA/DIGITALVISION/GETTY IMAGES, TUNCAY GÜNDOĞDU/DIGITALVISION/GETTY IMAGES, ZARICM/DIGITALVISION/GETTY IMAGES
Newsweek
LearningEnglish
Newsweek Learning English
kasiabudzen94@hotmail.com
054-058_NLE hybrid work. po kor ELindd.indd 58
22.10.2023 13:53