45A Workplace
Hybrid of
Home and HQ
Flexibility is key
in reimagining
office culture
for the post-
pandemic worldSolomon, chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs
Group Inc., has called remote work “an aberration that
we are going to correct as quickly as possible.”
Jenny Burns, a partner at London consulting firm
Fluxx, says the issue of where and when employees work
is among the biggest challenges businesses face today.
While some traditionalists believe they can return to their
pre-pandemic setup, she cautions against that. “If you
slip back into old ways quickly, you will lose employees,”
says Burns, who advises big companies on reimagining
their working environments.
Speak Media, a 20-person provider of multimedia
content to corporate clients, has walked away from its
London office lease and is pressing ahead with a hybrid
plan. Co-founder George Theohari wants employees
to keep talking while working at home, testing short,
focused virtual meetings and impromptu breakout ses-
sions. Longer term, he plans to rent space in a London
coworking facility so staff can gather there for team
get-togethers and crucial client meetings—or simply
because they want to get off the couch for a day.
Theohari says the point is giving people freedom
to work where they’re most likely to thrive, taking into
account domestic circumstances and personality.
“Younger team members’ experience of working in the
pandemic, compared to mine, may be much more neg-
ative,” he says. He cites, for instance, his own good for-
tune at being able to spend less time commuting and
more time with his family vs. the frustration of people
in their 20s, who are more likely to live alone in small
apartments. To address that issue, he’s hired a work-
place coach to help staff talk through problems. “As an
employer, you always have a duty to care for your teams,”
he says. “That’s been brought sharply into focus by this.”
At Aviva, Harmer envisages that some meetings
will require in-person attendance. But many others will
become all-remote to mitigate concerns that people who
come to the office regularly will be more visible to lead-
ers and will jump to the front of the line for promotions.
The increased flexibility, she says, will make it easier for
the company to recruit from a wider talent pool. An inter-
nal leadership candidate who’d balked at the prospect
of a long commute to London recently reconsidered the
idea, as she now has the option of traveling to the city
when necessary while mostly working from her home
in Norwich, in the east of England. And that will ulti-
mately benefit the entire business, Harmer says. “There
is a competitive advantage,” she says, “in anything that
makes employees look at you and go, ‘That sounds like
a great place to work.’ ” �Adam BlenfordTHE BOTTOM LINE While some traditionalists will return to pre-pandemic
ways, many companies are embracing—or at least accepting—policies that
allow working both at home and in the office, according to employees’ needs.After joining U.K. insurance group Aviva Plc last year,
Danny Harmer spent just a few weeks with her new
team before the first Covid-19 lockdown. If she has her
way, that will be the most time the group ever spends
together. Harmer, Aviva’s personnel chief, is figuring out
the post-Covid working environment for the compa-
ny’s 16,000 British employees, spread among 14 offices
from London to the Scottish city of Perth. And what she’s
found is that while many miss the collaboration that can
happen in the office, they also like the freedom of work-
ing remotely. “There’s a change in mindset brought on
by the pandemic,” she says. “People have experienced
it and go, ‘Yes, I want some of this.’ ”
A recent Aviva survey found that 95% of its staff
would choose either full-time remote work or a flexible
home- office split once lockdowns end. The company is
now attempting to institute what Harmer calls a “smart”
working policy, closing some offices and allowing every-
one the option of logging in from home, with access to
redesigned company facilities when they feel the need.
That flexibility makes Aviva something of a pio-
neer among companies grappling with the post-
Covid workplace. Some are embracing—or at least
accepting—a hybrid home-office configuration, with
HSBC Holdings Plc predicting a 40% reduction in its
property footprint over the long term and Lloyds Banking
Group Plc projecting a 20% cut in office space by 2023.
Others, though, are less excited about the idea: David◼ SOLUTIONS Bloomberg Businessweek March 8, 2021