Can Hybrid Save It?
4 million.
According to a recent study from the US Labor Department, this is the number of workers who have quit their jobs since April 2021. The massive employee turnover has led the US to its highest levels of voluntary resignation in generations and has been coined "the great resignation."
A Complete Mindset Shift in How We Work
While several colliding trends are driving the “great resignation,” the primary factor is a complete mindset shift about the intersection of work and one’s personal life.
In a recent interview with Axios, University of Michigan economist’s Betsey Stevenson said that due to the long time working from home during the pandemic, people have had a little more space to ask themselves: “Is this really what I want to be doing?’’
Workers are not only redefining what it is that they want to be doing, but also how they want to be doing it.
"I would definitely leave my current position if I got called back into the office full-time," says S. Poore, an engineer who has been working in an office setup for 15 years. "And the reason is that I'm sick of the days where we sit in the office just to say we did so; I would like it to be hybrid where we come in for specific in-person meetings or demos."
Like S. Poore, a growing number of white-collar workers are thinking of leaving for more flexible work arrangements and opportunities.
While there have been many, many low points over the past year due the pandemic, our mandated work-at-home condition has shown that people can be very productive working from their homes while enjoying benefits such as the elimination of commuting time, along with the savings from tolls, gas and/train or bus fares. Additional benefits have included increased flexibility in childcare arrangements, along with lower exposure to COVID-19 and other easily communicable diseases such as the flu.
Remote Work Is Not for Everyone
While some employees are considering leaving their roles if their companies call them back to a physical office, still others are looking to leave if their organizations decide to go fully remote.
A recent study from Sharp Corp. found that 60% of six thousand white-collar workers missed working with co-workers in the office and worried about the tradeoff of getting passed over for opportunities if they were to fully embrace a remote work model.
What does it mean for the great resignation? When it comes to redefining work, there are options, challenges and even opportunities. A fully remote or non-remote office could influence white-collar workers to resign based on their affinity to remote work.
Employees and employers will need to meet halfway. This is where a hybrid work setup can help.
The Hybrid Office - Can It Save the Great Resignation?
The hybrid office gives employees the flexibility to work both from their corporate office, at home, or anywhere they choose.
Organizations can either set hybrid work schedules that outline the dates and times when employees are expected to work in the office or give employees autonomy in choosing their hybrid schedule.
While the most common hybrid office setup is the '3-2-2' (work three days at home, two days at the office), hybrid is about offering flexibility to come to the office as needed. This could then mean an employee could choose one day at the office and four days at home.
According to a 2021 US PwC study, when it comes to employees' preferences for where they work:
28% want to work remotely five days a week
35% prefers two or three days
10% are leaning towards four days
10% want to work in the office for one day
8% want to work in the office all days
It would then seem that there is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to the hybrid office.
The hybrid office is about finding the right balance for both the company and the employees and offering the best of both worlds: the flexibility to work from home part-time and the benefit of in-office interactions.
This makes the hybrid office a potential solution to mitigating some of the turnover expected from the great resignation.
According to a small LinkedIn survey Splashtop ran, when we asked fifty-seven professional if hybrid work could "save " us from the "great resignation," 86% responded affirmatively.
Some employees like Coffee Semantics' web designer Jamie Hickey are strongly advocating for the hybrid office. Jamie started a work petition stating that he and his twenty-two colleagues would leave for other companies if they are not offered a hybrid option because they strongly believe that they can do their best work from anywhere.
What Is the Best Technology for Setting up a Hybrid Office?
As companies everywhere think about how they can best enable hybrid work and office set-ups, many are challenged with how they provide flexibility through and with the technology they deploy.
We have found that the key is to make the connection between the home office and remote office as seamless and painless as possible.
Prior to the pandemic, since working from home was often an outlier, many IT departments offered VPNs (Virtual Private Networks) as the way to connect to the office remotely.
However, as millions of workers were sent home to work, VPNs began to show their inadequacies. Originally designed for users who need access to the corporate networks for short durations, VPNs became overwhelmed when entire workforces stayed connected via VPN all day long. With VPNs being used far beyond their original design, IT departments often found them to be slow, complicated for users to leverage and costly to deploy.
An alternative to VPNs for thousands of businesses has been Splashtop's remote access software. Offering super-fast connections, supporting all types of operating systems and built-in ease of use, many companies found it to be an affordable alternative to traditional VPNs.
What Is Remote Access Software and How Does It Work?
Remote access (or remote desktop) software provides the ability to control any computer remotely. Users install the remote desktop software on their office computers and connect remotely at home using their laptops. Users have access to all software and files as if they are sitting in front of their computer in the office.
Splashtop offers one of the best-performing, affordable remote access software for setting up a hybrid office. It is the trusted choice for many major brands, including Marriott, FedEx, UPS, Toyota, Stanford Health Care, Harvard Medical School, Turner Broadcasting, and Tapestry.
If you are exploring switching to a hybrid office model, we strongly encourage you to give our remote desktop software a try. Try it for free to test how it works, and watch the video below for a high-level demo.
