Why your people still need the office

Working with colleagues in the same space helps people build friendships, camaraderie and trust at work. That face-to-face interaction means your employees are more likely to feel part of a team and develop a stronger sense of togetherness.

Time spent together in the same place allows your employees to understand one another, communicate, and bond in a way that telephone conversations or video calls could never replicate. That’s important. According to a global LinkedIn study on working relationships, 46 percent of professionals believe that work friends are integral to their overall happiness, boosting productivity and engagement levels.

When we spend time with others, it makes us happier, improves our cognitive skills, sharpens our memory, and may even lead to living a longer life. We also experience the release of oxytocin – a hormone that can induce anti-stress-like effects such as reducing adrenocorticotropin and cortisol levels, which are often associated with high blood pressure, weight gain and heart disease.

Friendships are crucial for younger generations entering the workforce for the first time, especially for building lasting friendships. We surveyed four-hundred 18 – 24 year olds in full-time employment in England, asking them to cite the reasons they wanted to be in the office. The top answer was “socialising and making friends”.

Workplaces often provide a healthier environment than the average home, especially those that are developed to achieve WELL Building Standards. The healthiest workplaces optimise indoor air quality by removing contaminants, and minimise disruption to the body’s circadian rhythm through smart lighting output and controls. Wellness can be further enhanced by selecting furniture with low VOCs and having biophilia throughout the office. In combination, these factors create a healthy space that prioritises employee wellbeing.

Offices are the backbone of organisations for numerous reasons. In addition to the employee benefits, the office is a vital component of a thriving business. Bringing people together generates social capital, the combined value of your people, their networks, and their interactions with one another. In the office, social capital forms because people can more readily socialise, understand and talk to one another, and work together. The concept comes alive through ‘three Cs’:

Community – When an organisation is connected by more than just a company name, shares values, and embraces a common culture that manifests in the workplace.

Collaboration – The main driver behind collective decision-making and one of the most significant influences in modern-day office design

Camaraderie – More than just an outcome of social interaction, it allows employees to achieve things together and create better business outcomes.

The office and office experience can be important differentiators for potential recruits. Young employees thrive in an office environment – they want a workplace that is fun, social and a place where they can constantly learn, whether through formal mentoring or simply observing others.

Ambitious recruits also want face-to-face access to mentors and learning and development opportunities. Organisations that neglect their workplace while putting too much emphasis on remote working risk turning these people away and losing the talented people they already have to competitors who are prepared to offer them what they want.

Finally, it’s important to remember the impact that long periods of home working can have on individuals, especially young people who tend to face a specific set of challenges when working remotely. Often living in shared accommodation, many young people lack adequate space at home to work either comfortably or productively. Others struggle for different reasons. Data of 160,000 home-based employees collected by global employee experience assessors Leesman in 2021 found that 72 percent did not have a dedicated work room to work from at home. For others, working from home impacts motivation. A survey from the World Economic Forum reveals that 38 percent of employees find it difficult to be productive when working from home, while one-third feel burned out by their work when doing it from their place of residence.

While some key meetings can and do happen over video or telephone calls, many clients and investors prefer to hold in person meetings to build optimal working relationships (and sustain them through trust and rapport). The office is a far more effective setting for building these relationships with customers and other stakeholders, having sensitive conversations and solving problems.

A 2021 study found that 84 percent of people still prefer in-person business meetings. The top reasons included:

• Easier to build stronger, more meaningful business relationships

• Provides a greater ability to read body language and facial expressions

• Enables more social interaction

• Allows for more complex strategic thinking

• A better environment for tough, timely decision-making

For those that do wish to meet in person, having a central hub in the form of an office can pay dividends. Not only can it be used to showcase work and give a real insight into a buzzing business, but it can also provide clients with a genuine flavour of your brand and operations, demonstrating how things tick over on a day-to-day basis.

Make a statement:

Be clear about why you want your employees back and how it will benefit them. Lay out your expectations and be consistent with your messaging. Leaving these things to interpretation can sow confusion and distrust, making the transition back to the office even more challenging. Tactful communication is key to show employees that you trust them to work from home just as well as in the office.

Lead by example:

Are you mandating that everyone is in the office on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday? You need to be present on those days to avoid setting double standards.

Be flexible:

Embrace hybrid working – employees may expect it as the standard from now on. Insisting on a full time return to the office could lead to the loss of talent. Find out what your employees want because what works for one person might not suit another. Develop a model that tries to give people as much flexibility as they need and make provisions for vulnerable staff members.

Support the commute:

Accept that commuting is now a major barrier to bringing people back to the office and address this through actions such as subsidising employees travel costs or having core office hours that allow them to travel outside of the traditional rush hours.

Make the office an enticing destination. Crystal clear branding in the office can communicate specific messages to employees. Meanwhile, the design and fit out of a space can encourage your employees to work in a certain way and make them feel more committed to the company in the long run.

Give employees a reason to return and then keep coming back. Create FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) for team members who are more reluctant to head back to the office. Schedule events and create as many opportunities as you can to bring people together and build that all important social capital. Through a change management process, get your employees excited about the new office before they even step into it.

People want to spend time together. A great office design can be the final nudge they need to come in more frequently.