One of the topics I do not see coming up nearly often enough in the conversation around return to office is whether the workplace itself is appropriate for the current world. Bringing employees together in person is a worthwhile endeavor (even though I will consistently argue that mandates are not the right way to do it). But bringing employees together in a space that does not actively support the activities you want those employees to engage in is self-defeating. The worst case scenario is that you force employees to come in to specifically interact and engage but the office they come back to makes all interaction difficult and annoying causing them all to just wish they were back at home having virtual conversations again.
Not all workplaces are the same. We all instinctively know this but our impression of the average workplace is skewed to the one we work from most often. One of the debates currently happening in corporate real estate is around desk versus collaboration space design. Conversation and interaction best happen in collaborative spaces. However, most employees still have heads-down work they need or want to do during the day in the office. There are many critical considerations, including:
- Does this mean we should be giving them 2x the spaces for the day?
- Can booking tools solve this?
- Should interactions be scheduled like meetings?
- How can we handle conversations in open-air areas so others do not get distracted?
- Do employees use the office differently on different days?
- What kind of technology is needed for interactions and collaboration?
Bad workplaces cause employees in the office to resort back to virtual techniques. If you ever see an employee in the office having a virtual call with another employee in the same office, you understand what I mean. It breaks your heart to see it happen but this is the new normal of mandates. Malicious compliance is something that all of us have done at some point in our careers. Why would we expect that to not happen now?
All this to say, your workplace strategy is make or break with your cultural collaboration goals. You cannot hope for in-person collaboration success without a workplace setup to enable it the right way. This is not an easy topic. I have yet to see great examples of collaboration-first workplaces that would work generally. The furniture is still being innovated. The technology is still evolving. The office behaviors are still being understood. But starting somewhere with your workplace is better than just hoping to throw a bunch of people in a room together 3 times a week will magically make productivity better.