What to consider when going hybrid

As the working world embraces the reality that we aren't going back to old ways of working, a growing chorus of leaders are forecasting a hybrid-remote future. While the allure of this concept is understandable—it seems to present the best of two worlds on paper—a great deal of nuance lurks.

In fact, without great deliberation, care, and intentionality, hybrid can deliver the worst of both worlds.

If you're charging down this road, you'll want to consider and plan for the points below to minimize dysfunction and the toxic friction of a two-tier work environment.

Only some days in the office

Companies that mandate or encourage one or more days per week in-office should be mindful of three important factors:

1. This inhibits team members from considering drastically different living locales, because they still need to be within a commutable distance to an office.

2. This prevents a company's sourcing and recruiting teams from operating differently compared to having all employees co-located. New hires will still need to relocate to the general office area, limiting your talent pool.

3. This will make the process of shifting to remote-first workflows more difficult, as the office will serve as a crutch to collaboration.

These are not necessarily deal-breakers, but they should be factored into any decision about a hybrid setup.

Informal meetings

Informal (or unscheduled and unplanned) meetings in an office can be highly disruptive to hybrid-remote teams. While it may feel efficient to ask someone you see in a hallway for a few minutes of their time, this typically creates disruption in the day of the person you're hailing and leads to undocumented progress.

Any progress made in an informal conversation is invisible to those outside of the office as well as others in the office who are not invited to the meeting. Unplanned meetings with undocumented results works against the remote-first practice of documenting all work so that others in the organization can contribute.

Leaders should reinforce a particular rigor on documenting takeaways after informal meetings so that context is agreed upon, visible to others regardless of their location, and to minimize miscommunication and gossip.

Redesigned spaces for individual meeting rooms

Hybrid calls are also sub-optimal for remote attendees. Leaders transitioning to hybrid-remote should consider redesigning existing office space to optimize for individual workspaces and individual meeting rooms. This reinforces that the office is simply another venue to work remotely from.

By eliminating conference rooms, a company ensures collaboration is accessible to all and removes the temptation to have in-office team members gather around a single camera for a video call with remote attendees.

Leaders may consider keeping one or two large spaces that can be reserved for team on-sites such as fiscal year planning or team bonding, where entire teams or sub-teams will intentionally travel on specific dates to meet in person. It's important to still document outcomes from these gatherings and ensure that 100 percent of the team is included.

Agendas upfront

The most functional hybrid organizations operate remote-first. This ensures that business continues even if 100 percent of the workforce opts to work remotely, outside of the office, on any given day. A key part of reinforcing this mindset is the mandate that all work meetings have an upfront agenda.

Practically speaking, this means that all in-office meeting invites have a shared agenda document attached, so that others can read, learn, and contribute regardless of their location or even time zone. This process ensures that a live documented meeting procedure happens even for onsite meetings.

This is critical for process continuity regardless of where a team member is located. In a hybrid organization, you will have team members who conduct onsite meetings some days, and remote meetings on other days. It's vital that the process of those meetings is the same—it's merely the physical position of a team member that changes.

Coffee chats should be indiscriminate of location

Coffee chats are an excellent way to broaden one's perspective and meet new people from across the organization. Hybrid organizations should take care to not enable selective coffee chat pairing based on who is onsite and who is remote, as it signals a two-tier work environment.

Record important conversations

The proximity of people in an office makes hallway, watercooler, and ad hoc conversations appealing. Leaders in hybrid-remote settings should reinforce the importance of using a smartphone as a recording device to capture important, non-confidential work-related conversations, with the consent of both parties. Recording conversations ensure that takeaways can be shared transparently with those outside of the office and minimises potential misinterpretations.

Leadership's place in the office

The best place for leaders and executives to be in a hybrid-remote environment is outside of the office.

1. This prevents remote team members from being penalized for a perceived lack of "face time" with executives.

2. This prevents senior leadership from conducting their work in ways that are counter to remote-first principles.

3. This prevents cognitive dissonance from leadership on what tools, technologies, and training need to be prioritized to support remote-first workflows.

4. This prevents team members from coming to the office solely to rub shoulders with executives.

5. This reinforces that the office is no longer the epicenter of power or decision making.

Spontaneous social events

It's understandable for team members to want to gather socially in and around office settings. Structuring informal communication is vital in a remote setting, and some companies may choose to repurpose some of their office space to accommodate groups and gatherings. Libraries, fitness centres, game rooms, and music studios (among others) could be created to facilitate social gatherings for those who are on-site on any given day.

Leaders who enable this should be mindful of the following:

1. It's important to budget for travel to include remote team members in onsite social events.

2. Work should not happen in social rooms, because it hinders transparency and creates dysfunction by forming communication silos.

Equitable benefits and perks

Leaders should carefully evaluate spoken and unspoken perks of the office, and seek to extend equal benefits to those outside of the office. For example, access to an on-site daycare and fitness centre would demand a childcare and fitness credit for those who are remote by default. This situation becomes particularly tricky for team members who are on-site some days of the week, and off-site others, unless the credits are extended to all.

Expect rapid iteration

Hybrid-remote organizations may see high office use in the early days of a workplace transition, as people flock to the familiar. However, as remote-first workflows are implemented and people relocate or change their workplace setting for personal reasons, it's possible that more space will go unused.

While this may seem jarring, it's a positive indicator that work and culture are progressing without the need for an office. This will create opportunities to capture greater real estate savings and/or repurpose office space for philanthropic efforts, such as opening up an internship centre for the local community.

Know more about the hybrid workplace model at People Matters TechHR SEA 2021 from 5th to 7th May. Click here to register.