Does the way people work in a hybrid working world work?

This advert for The Economist featuring the strapline ‘Lose the ability to slip out of meetings unnoticed’ is one I often refer to when talking about the pros and cons of what has just become a statutory entitlement. As an employee, you now have a tribunal to refer to if your request to work from home, hybrid work, work part time, job share, have compressed hours, work flexitime, work to annualised hours, work for staggered hours or enjoy a phased retirement aren’t carefully examined by your employer and responded to in a ‘reasonable manner’.

Presumably, your interview with your tribunal will be on a Teams call and you’ll be able to present your case while wearing your trackies. So, what are people going to do with the 90,000 odd hours they used to spend in the office?

One thing they won’t be doing as much is collaborating, and without so much collaboration they won’t be learning as much. The new intake will probably instead spend a good deal of time in online training sessions put together by the HR department. Will the HR department be able to tell you how to make your client laugh, though, or even like you?

Staring at a screen on your own all day won’t exactly make you into the life and soul of the party, but that’s OK because your employer will have a system in place to manage your mental health issues, loneliness, isolation, feelings of low worth and fear of exclusion.

The Office was the UK’s most popular ever television sit-com. Stephen Merchant and Ricky Gervais never expected it to take off in the way it did, but unlike Mad Men, which was equally influential, it didn’t glamourise the workspace. Instead, it focused on the mundanity of it; the place was a mess full of losers and what it was really about was human interaction. Hating your boss was important; it gave the day a purpose. It was fun to fall in love at the water cooler. Whingeing about your parking space was expected. That’s what you got together to rant about in the pub after work.

At FOOTPRINT+ in London this year, we will have a remote working traditional office set-up, and on each desk will be an office desk nameplate with the quote: ‘Working From Home is not Utopia, it’s Dystopia’. Remote workers will be invited to choose a coloured Post-It note and stick it on the desk as they leave: red for ‘I Hate It’ and green for ‘I Love It’. It will be interesting to see what colour the desks are when we close. We might put in an orange one for ‘Undecided’. We haven’t made our minds up yet.

FOOTPRINT+ will take place on 8 to 9 May at Old Billingsgate Market in London. To find out more, click here.