BitDepth#1347
MARK LYNDERSAY
MICROSOFT issued its annual Work Trend Index on March 16, and it's a timely document, considering trends in how and where work is done as the world emerges from the blanket of pandemic restrictions (https://bit.ly/3qA2PuV).
Has this country learned anything from a two-year course in hybrid work that nobody asked for? Is either the private or public sector ready to adapt after that experience?
In March 2020, the Occupational Health and Safety Agency of TT published a list of cautions for returning to work that remains relevant.
Nothing about how covid19 is transmitted has changed since then, but despite reduced hospitalisations, do we need everyone back right away?
The Government's institutional attitude on the workplace remains very much rooted in presence and in-person accountability while the rudimentary online customer-facing tools implemented during the pandemic appear to be in the process of being rolled back or simply abandoned.
Microsoft's report identifies five key findings that have followed the period of enforced hybrid work:
* Employees have a new "worth it" equation.
* Managers feel wedged between leadership and employee expectations.
* Leaders need to make the office worth the commute.
* Flexible work doesn't have to mean "always on."
* Rebuilding social capital (how comfortably employees work together) looks different in a hybrid world.
The bigger and more committed to bricks and mortar a business or public sector service is in TT, the more likely it seems that hybrid work will be dismissed as an aberration of covid19.
While many small and medium businesses have been affected, some terminally, others have adapted.
One of them is Media InSite, a media monitoring firm led by Allison Demas.
On October 1, 2020, Demas took the company 100 per cent virtual after her staff settled into working from home and the company moved its media monitoring equipment to a co-location facility.
Media InSite's staff proved productive working remotely and preferred it.
"Although I am a relatively reserved person," Demas said, "I do miss personal interaction with members of my team."
There were also technical challenges. Finding a home for the media monitoring equipment was an early concern, along with ensuring that full-time employees had desktops or laptops and everyone had a reliable internet connection with adequate bandwidth.
"The biggest challenge since making the switch has been maintaining employee engagement," Demas said.
Most of her full-time employees (21 of 23) are millennials, so there was majority enthusiasm from these digital natives.
"Do a thorough cost benefit analysis before making such a decision," Demas advised.
"Have an open mind and be flexible. Only if your brick-and-mortar model is imperative, given the nature of your business or organisation, should you reject the hybrid or remote work model."
For Media InSite, the result has been a reduction in expenditure with the elimination of office rental and related busin
