Q: Last week you discussed dealing with employees who’re reluctant to come back to work as we begin to slowly open up. My employees are OK returning, but some of them are trying to negotiate more work-from-home flexibility going forward.

We had a strong team before the pandemic and admittedly, they have performed well working from home –better than I anticipated, so I’m open to the idea. However, I think it’s important that we come together again, while maintaining social distance. How do I decide who can have a flexible schedule, and what that should look like?

A: You bring up a great point about productivity. The general consensus out there is that office workers have remained impressively productive while working from home. But I think that high productivity is being fueled by the relationships, trust and cohesiveness that already existed before the pandemic. What we are seeing are the long coat-tails of work friendships and goodwill that grew over time working together. Whether that level of productivity can be maintained long term is very unlikely. Since Zoom is no substitute for in-person interaction, those relationships will fade, growing more distant while the team becomes less cohesive.  So I agree and understand why you think it’s “important that we come together again.”

Having said all that, this pandemic has allowed the working-from-home genie out of the bottle -for good.

Employees are finding many advantages to working from home. They see they’re saving lots of money on gas, lunch and clothes. They’ve also found that they’re saving lots of time, on commuting, getting ready in the morning, and extraneous work meetings. AND they’re also realizing that they can help the climate crisis and the environment by driving less, flying less, making less trash and consuming fewer products.

All the time and money they save can go towards, for example, a daily workout, or a meditation practice or making a nice healthy dinner that in the past would have seemed impossible after a long tiring workday. So it’s no surprise, workers are going to want more flexibility, and it’s good you are open to the idea because it’s a request employers will no longer be able to easily brush off.

So what criteria should you use when deciding who can work from home, and how many days a week?

Let’s explore that next time.

©Copyright Eva Del Rio

Eva Del Rio is creator of HR Box™ – tools for small businesses and startups. Send questions to Eva@evadelrio.com