What is the new normal? Full-time workers dropping in to the office. Companies now offer a range of flexible hours or even fully remote work. For decades, working in an office full-time has been the norm, but this new normal of working remotely and making random in-office visits could be here to stay.

At LACOSTA, we must carefully adjust to workers coming into the office irregularly, at odd hours of the night, or for spur-of-the-moment meetings. For employers, the new vs the old model is a judgment call based on certain pros and cons. 

The Cons

It has been found that, on average, employees working from home only turn up to work in person at the office about one or two days a week. While many of them do manage to finish their jobs and get paid for it, bosses are finding that it’s quite difficult to keep on top of who is actually doing what.

Remote employees have to make extra efforts to stay in touch with co-workers, clients and executives. And one study found that surprisingly, remote workers take more sick days than those who work in an office full time.

Does working remotely increase your efficiency? In short, no. Working remotely can be detrimental to both productivity and innovation for several reasons. First, remote workers don’t get exposed to other people’s ideas as often as they would if they were in an office environment. Second, it becomes easier to become complacent when you aren’t around other people who might inspire you with new ideas or challenge your thinking. Finally, remote workers are less accountable for getting things done because there isn’t real-time feedback.

The Pros

Here is the most obvious advantage of remote working: No commute. On average workers spend up to 2 hours commuting every day. This time is physically and mentally draining – maybe not exhausting – but certainly a waste of time, energy and gas.   

Many workers avoid the office because coworkers are loud and distracting. Also sitting every day all day at one’s desk leads to an unhealthy sedentary lifestyle. Commute time often can be converted to healthy exercise time.

According to one recent study, people who worked at home were 13 percent more productive than those who worked outside their homes and 17 percent more productive than those who worked inside their offices.

The modern-day office is evolving. These days, you’re more likely to find an entrepreneur working from home or a software engineer splitting their time between home and a co-working space than stuck in an office for eight hours a day.

Is Productivity All That Matters?

In jobs that require creativity, innovation, and development, face to face collaboration can be critical. Brainstorming, bouncing ideas back and forth, creative and critical input, all work best in a hybrid (individual and collaborative) on-site environment.

Covid is not over

Due to the Covid pandemic, all workers have been exposed to remote work at home. For many workers there is just no going back and the new normal is here to stay. It seems the most critical factor in determining individual cases is the nature of the work; i.e. is the work collaborative, individual, collective (e.g. line work) or hybrid?

LACOSTA’s work programming is efficiency-driven, and very flexible.  Our system allows for adaptation to any type of building use including the new normal.