Working from home is not new. Nor is the technology that allows it to happen effectively and at scale. Global organisations have had remote workforces and teams that work across multiple time zones for decades. The seismic shift that occurred recently across public, private, and non-government sectors is not an IT transformation. It has not been a complete rethinking of how IT can serve new markets and ways of producing and delivering products and services. It has, instead, been a way to get people working from home at scale.

Now that we have proven the technology works at scale most workplaces have a threefold challenge:

1. follow through on the IT transformation and truly digitalise the economy and our businesses,

2. commit to giving people a choice to work from home, in the office, or blend both options,

3. address the persistent (non-IT related) problems that frustrate our workforce.

We work with people in our capacities as executive coach and barrister and this article is based on a deliberately deep dive into the perspectives on how the global pandemic has affected the general take on work, how it’s done and where it’s done.

Lessons for the future

A great percentage of our workforces will seek greater choice and flexibility to work from home, or combine working from home with intervals in the workplace after restrictions are lifted. Employees will seek to continue working from home for many reasons, including increased productivity, saving travel time and costs, balancing work with caring responsibilities, avoiding office politics, avoiding toxic workplace cultures, just to name some of the more obvious ones.

People who opted to continue to go into the workplace during this period have also expressed a desire for the option to work from home in the future. What might have started out as silver linings to the new arrangements, which were not adopted by choice, are now being sought by a lot more people than anticipated. Put simply, people would like to have choice in relation to where, when, and how they work.

Working from home is not a panacea, but many people think it is. They are celebrating the reprieve they have from having to “deal with difficult personalities”. The truth is that the disruption has amplified the divide between people who have emotional intelligence capability, or the emotional capabilities required to lead and those who do not.

In our work as executive coach and barrister we hear from people who “want people in the office” and that this is “key to getting work done”. People who are proudly “old school” about demanding a return to the workplace tend not to be open to using technology or emotional capabilities to lead. These people tend to think more about what they want from their teams than what their teams want or need from them. They are open to culture change, but they want it to “come from the top” and don’t see a role in it for themselves.

Many businesses have discovered, almost taken by surprise, that their employees have worked successfully from home and, in some instances, productivity has increased. That shows that businesses that had the IT infrastructure, have transitioned a lot smoother to working remotely.

Many employees and employers have cited a working from home productivity dividend. People are getting more done at home because there are less interruptions, even with caring responsibilities (when the schools were still closed) and they find it good for deep thinking. However, most managers are still monitoring presenteeism and time, not deliverables or outcomes.

We questioned whether a new managerial style would evolve rapidly post lockdown – a shift from managing time to managing deliverables – but we have not seen this. This is needed and should come as managers understand the implications of the changes in their business environment and their employees’ needs.

It is indisputable that working from home is not for everyone, just as working in the office wasn’t either. However, working in the office was less contested simply because it was the ‘norm’.

There will be, without a doubt, employees who would need to be at work for many reasons:

1. they do not have the space to work from home (having your desk on the kitchen bench will lose its appeal after a while)

2. the ‘safety net’ they experience whilst working in a team and having the opportunity to get direct collaboration and/or supervision

3. social interaction is vital for their well-being and team relationships

4. procrastinators who would get the job done only when they feel the peer pressure to do the work.

Returning to the workplace

It’s arguable that a transformation in leadership has not occurred but is needed. We need to hasten the transformation in leadership, from traditional paradigms to modern forms of leadership which embrace a diverse and remote workforce.

From coaching and leadership development perspectives, there is a great need to change and challenge workplace cultures, upskill leaders, and give people choice.

From employment law perspective, workplaces should adopt flexible working policies that would encourage working remotely and make it available to larger categories of employees rather than what has been available under the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) so far. Under the Act, flexible working arrangements are available when certain conditions are met.

It seems that one of the hardest things to deal with at work during the COVID-19 pandemic are the things that were already causing significant levels of frustration: poor decision making, bullying and harassment, a lack of direction, toxic work environments, and not learning from the past or each other.

People working from home are enjoying being able to get their job done while being removed from a toxic workplace. They find it easier to manage their emotions. In some cases, this has revealed an underlying deficit in teamwork behaviours and emotional capabilities needed to lead and work collaboratively.

The transition to work from home has provided a relief or an escape from dealing with these things. What will happen when people return to work? We predict that the underlying issues will still be there, and people might be even more fearful of returning to a toxic workplace.

What change is needed to sustain the lessons?

The key lessons we observe are:

1. people seek greater choice about where, when and how they work

2. working from home is not a panacea

3. unresolved conflict and poor cultures were amplified by the rapid move to working from home

4. leaders need to develop emotional capabilities to be effective in the new environment

5. managers need to shift from managing time to managing deliverables and outcomes.

Workplaces should not return to the ‘old norm’ as soon as the lockdown is lifted. We should all continue applying what we learned whilst we were forced to work remotely and continue applying such lessons.

Flexibility and development of new leadership capabilities are key in the newly created workplace environment. This will involve allowing employees to choose where they want to work in order to allow them to be more efficient and combining working from home with periods in the office. It will also involve developing leadership capabilities, especially the emotional capabilities needed to lead during periods of uncertainty and change.

Dr Kim Vella is an internationally accredited executive coach – more details on www.kimvella.com.au

Anca Costin is a Canberra-based barrister - more details on www.ancacostin.com.au