The WFH revolution is losing momentum, but it isn't goodbye to the employment mode yet. Photo / Getty Creative
The “new normal” is starting to look a bit more like the “old normal”.
The working-from-home (WFH) revolution suffered a signature setback in August last year when Zoom ordered staff back to the office for at least two days a week. The videoconferencing firm joined a wave of tech firms, banks and other companies requiring more time in the office - with performance reviews and bonuses often now tied to office attendance.
Now a wave of Kiwi employers are tightening rules around hybrid working, with three days at home reduced to two in many cases.
Some companies say while they favour a degree of hybrid working, they have now realised some of the drawbacks of remote working.
BusinessNZ says the worsening economy and tighter job market have also influenced thinking.
Workers who used to shop around for an employer with liberal work-from-home policies are suddenly wary of surveys that say WFH staff are the most likely to be culled as the employment tide turns, and the most likely to miss out on promotions. Those entering the workforce are worried they won’t pick up skills.
“There is certainly a shift back to the office for all sorts of reasons - [including] supervision, some employers are reporting drops in profitability from people working from home and allocation of work is more difficult,” said Hesketh Henry partner Jim Roberts, who has a front-row seat regarding workplace trends as the head of his firm’s employment law team.
“There’s also a groundswell among some employees to shift back to work [in the office],” Roberts said. But in some organisations, it won’t be easy to turn back the clock.
“People have moved cities. Teams have scattered around New Zealand.”
BusinessNZ chief executive Kirk Hope said the extent of hybrid working was changing.
The Workplace Wellness survey conducted by BusinessNZ and Southern Cross Health Insurance in 2023 showed more than half of the businesses and organisations surveyed allowed people to work from home, with one to two days per week spent working from home being the most common option - but also that some companies, especially small businesses, were just not able to support the option.
But now: “Given the current economic and employment environment, matters like productivity are coming under more scrutiny. And organisations certainly value collaboration between staff as a critical component of work function and competitive advantage,” Hope said.
“Employers are looking at the scope of hybrid working and doing things like moving from working from home two days to one or zero.”
Another shift: Many employers are moving to manage flexibility through glide-time office hours rather than hybrid or work-from-home models, Hope said.
Rush-hour traffic has been one of the bluntest measures of the shift in momentum. Aucklanders who think it’s now actually worse than before the pandemic aren’t imagining it, according to data collected by AT (see chart above).
Public transport numbers are still below pre-Covid levels, but in the context of ongoing public transport staff shortages and infrastructure issues that have cut train services.
Because of a stoush with unionised staff, One NZ has had one of the higher-profile policy changes as it reduced three days at home to two for many of its staff shortly before Christmas.
The telco still championed the remote working options it expanded during the pandemic, but “some teams felt it was difficult to foster team culture, support personal development and build connections across the business when people are working remotely”, spokesman Conor Roberts said.
“Bringing team members together in person for at least three days a week helps with that, but also retains the flexibility we know people value.”
“We shouldn’t catastrophise it and say it’s the end of hybrid work,” Massey University workplace behavioural expert Dr Jarrod Haar said.
“They’re still saying, ‘we’ll support you working from home [for] two days a week’.”
Looking more broadly at the reduction in hybrid working, Haar said, “I understand the logic.”
“I think some of it though is managers who don’t think they can control their workers when they don’t see them - which I think is kind of funny. It can be personal insecurity more than actual productivity concerns,” he said.
“I encourage leaders to set performance goals. If someone says, ‘I struggled’, then say, ‘Next month, struggle in the office next to me so I can keep an eye on you’.”
But he adds that unless there are tight expectations around productivity, a problem worker is just as likely to goof off when they’re spending eight hours in the office. If there are detailed performance metrics, then those can enable hybrid working.
Haar’s ongoing wellness@work survey, which has surveyed just over 1000 Kiwis every few months since the pandemic began, found 31 per cent thought they were more productive working from home in November 2021. By December last year, that had jumped to 51 per cent.
The Massey academic also found that the number working from home part of the week (42 per cent) is only slightly below November 2021 (43 per cent), when the country was still in the thick of pandemic restrictions.
Haar said property is another factor. Firms who’ve taken multi-year, multimillion-dollar leases want to get their money’s worth.
However, it should also be noted that as leases renew or companies move to new digs, elements of the WFH revolution have been baked in in many cases. 2degrees’ new office off Quay St in Auckland’s CBD; Chorus’ new office, just across the street, was opened in 2022 with just 371 desks for 550 staff on the assumption hot-desking and remote working were long-term trends. And in the same year, ANZ New Zealand trimmed its footprint in ANZ Centre on Albert St by 1900sq m in the past year - roughly the equivalent of two floors in the tower - so only 70 per cent of its staff could be there at one time.
“Auckland traffic is a nightmare and buses are a lottery. Petrol has come down from its highs but it’s still expensive. You could literally grab a coffee and sit down at your desk and you could be anywhere from an hour earlier.”
Unite Union’s Sam Burnside-Woods said other benefits included better work-life balance and mental health, lower childcare costs and lower emissions.
But what about firms which say while staff might see themselves as more productive at home, they’re less profitable?
Haar said that line is often pushed by firms that are financially struggling, and US research indicates forcing staff back to the office has failed to boost their bottom line.
While working from home can be a godsend for new parents and provide valuable focus time for more experienced staff, a US study found a stunning 82 per cent of Gen Z - the so-called “laptop workers” - have never worked fulltime in an office, many fearing they lacked skills as a result. Many also suffered boredom, frustration or loneliness.
Haar says one answer could be that new staff have to work their first three or six months in the office. If more experienced staff aren’t always on-hand, then multiple mentors could be assigned.
You work three days a week from home. Your employer wants to trim that to two. Can they?
“Some people think they have an inherent right to work from home because they started to work from home during Covid,” Hesketh Henry’s Roberts said.
That’s not necessarily the case. It starts with your employment agreement, Roberts said. Does it specify a location of work, and what percentage of your work day you have to spend there?
And it doesn’t end with your contract. You might have received an email from a manager that says you can work from home - which could be regarded as contractual.
Then there can be nuances. “The difficulty for employers is that different managers might have had different discussions,” Roberts said.
And if, say, an Auckland firm has given one employee the green light to move to Tauranga and work remotely from there, it could be difficult to direct other staff back into the office for five days a week.
“There’s going to be some interesting litigation,” Roberts said.
While most staff are pushing to retain work-from-home perks they’ve enjoyed since the pandemic, those who are working fulltime in the office can push in the other direction.
Under the Employment Relations Act, people have the right to ask their employer for flexible working arrangements at any time. The employer has to respond, in writing, as soon as possible, but Roberts notes the Act gives them several grounds to decline, including disruption or an unequal burden on other employees.
EY: Monitoring, 60 per cent of time in office
The “Big Four” accounting firm has started monitoring UK employees’ office attendance, with swipe card entry data being circulated at senior levels of the firm as some of its staff flout its hybrid working guidelines, according to a Financial Times report. Some partners at the Big Four firm have been shown anonymised “turnstile access” data in recent weeks showing how frequently staff are attending its offices, FT said.
What’s the local situation?
“EY has always monitored overall levels of attendance in the office as it assists us to better utilise our workspace,” EY New Zealand managing partner Simon O’Connor said.
“We don’t monitor individual attendance. EY Auckland has one of the highest office utilisation rates in Oceania, and we have seen a strong desire by our people to return to working at the office or client sites post-Covid.
“Although it’s not mandated, we encourage our people to spend 60 per cent of their time working from the office or client sites as this builds a stronger culture of teaming, learning and connection that supports our people’s personal and professional development.”
Public servants
The Herald recently reported that the average office occupancy in some of Wellington’s most well-known government agencies is hovering just over 50 per cent.
That follows public servants adopting a “flexible by default” approach to working from home following the Covid-19 pandemic - a shift from asking “why should a role be flexible?” to “why not?”
NZTA Waka Kotahi had average office occupancy of 53 per cent, the Ministry of Health averages 55 per cent, according to swipe card data.
The exact situation is difficult to gauge because some Government departments, like the super ministry MBIE (staff: 3422) do not regularly track how many people are working from the office.
The Public Service Commission - which put together a set of lengthy but broad WFH guidelines for the public service - has two-thirds of staff either work from home one day a week or two days, according to a spokeswoman.
Spark: At least three days a week in the office, one “all-in day”
“After a couple of years of remote working due to the pandemic, we took the time to determine the right balance for our business, taking into consideration both flexibility for our people, as well as productivity and better customer outcomes,” a Spark spokeswoman said.
The nature of our business means not every team can operate remotely, such as our people in front-line, warehouse, or field service roles who need to be on-site, she said.
“But for the teams who are able to do so, last year we set clear standards for hybrid working to ensure consistency across the business. As part of this, our teams commit to at least three days in the office, with two days then flexible - where team members can choose to either be in the office or work remotely.”
Each team also has an “all-in” day each week, where everyone comes into a shared office space.
Next year, the telco will move into a new office on Albert St in Auckland’s CBD with expanded collaboration, parental space and social areas - reflecting the changing nature of office time in a hybrid week.
ASB: No mandated time
Across the Tasman, ASB’s corporate parent CBA ordered staff to spend at least 50 per cent of their time in the office from July last year, according to Australia’s Finance Sector Union (which objected, lodging a complaint with the Fair Work Commission).
Here, it’s a different story. “We encouraged a flexible working culture at ASB long before the pandemic and we continue to evolve how we work flexibly, which will mean different things for different teams, roles and individuals. For roles where flexible working is possible, we don’t mandate a specific number of in-office days,” an ASB spokeswoman said.
“But there is an expectation that our people spend time in the office to collaborate, foster connection and help to support the development of our team members. Like flexibility and balance, belonging is a very important driver of a positive work culture.”
2degrees: Help team all remote, others now at least 50pc in office
“Our care team all work remotely. It works for them and us to be fully remote, and means we can have staff nationwide – not just in Auckland,” a 2degrees spokesman said.
“It doesn’t make sense to insist that call centre staff commute to the office several times a week. They are of course welcome to come in if they like, and will come in for staff events from time to time.
“This year, we are asking non-call centre staff to spend at least half the time in the office – but we’re flexible here too – many people start early and finish early to dodge traffic, or will do more days one week, and fewer the next.”
In-person collaboration is vital in a dynamic challenger business like ours, but we recognise that some roles require less collaboration and teamwork than others, so it’s not a one-size-fits-all approach, the spokesman said. “We strive to be pragmatic and flexible, and ask that staff do the same.”
ANZ New Zealand: Half your time in the office
“Like other corporates, we’ve continued to focus on supporting staff back to work while embracing flexible working,” an ANZ spokeswoman said.
“Many of our staff in customer-facing roles are in our branches and offices for their full work hours. However, for everyone else with the option to work flexibly, we do still believe the workplace to be an important part of our culture, and there is an expectation that employees are in the office half the time.”
In Australia, AFR reported in November that ANZ staff members’ annual bonuses can now be cut if they fail to meet the 50 per cent office hours target.
Asked if that was the case here, the ANZ New Zealand spokeswoman said: “There are many different aspects that are included in staff performance expectations, including time spent in the office. We recognise there can be exceptional circumstances for individuals, and we continue to explore ways to best support the changing way our staff wish to work now and into the future.”
Chorus: ‘We need to spend more time together’
“But more importantly, I think post-Covid, flexibility continues to be something that’s really important. We can’t pivot back to ‘normal’. Who knows what normal even looks like any more?” Chorus chief people officer Jo Mataira said. “The pandemic is behind us; we still have weather events that disrupt business flow.”
Pre-Covid, Chorus had a guideline of three days spent in the office.
Now, with the pandemic receding and the firm shifting to its post-UFB rollout footing, it’s reassessing things in what Mataira says is an ongoing conversation between managers.
“It’s not a one-size-fits-all approach, flex-working. It’s not set-and-forget. Things shift. Nothing ever stays the same in a work context or a personal context, so those are regular conversations we have to strike the right balance.
“But as we move into our new operating model [with the completion of the UFB rollout], we’ve been talking about the fact we spend more time together. We’re working more collaboratively, so there are ongoing conversations about what that flex looks like.
“You can’t get away from face-to-face connection. I love it. I have a personal preference to be in the office a good amount of the time. But equally, I enjoy cracking through work at home.”
Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald’s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.
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