Back to the office, hybrid or fully remote?

I spoke to 1,000+ companies over the last 6 months to find out more about their plans

This is what I learned

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HQ’s are finished: companies will cut their commercial office space by 50-70%

The will allow every worker to work from home 2-4 days a week, and come into the office 1-2 days a week
Fully distributed: ~30% of the companies we talk to are getting rid of the office entirely and going remote-first

Companies doing this have seen their workers decentralize rapidly, leaving expensive cities to be closer to family
Access talent: The first reason they are going remote-first is simple – it lets them hire more talented people

Rather than hiring the best person in a 30-mile radius of the office, they can hire the best person in the world for every role
Cut costs: The second reason they are going remote-first is because it lets them be far more cost-efficient

Rather than spending $20,000 / worker / year on office space they can provide the best remote setup on the planet for $2,000 / worker / year
Remote burnout: The productivity inside the companies we’ve spoken to has gone through the roof

Their biggest concern is that workers burnout because they are working too hard

They are actively exploring ways to combat this
Remote onsites: 60%+ of companies we talk to are already thinking about ways to use time together physically to improve culture

The most popular we hear is flying the team into remote locations for ~week. Portugal, Spain, Puerto Rico seem to be the most popular
Personal choice: the smartest people I know personally are all planning to work remotely this decade

The most exciting companies I know personally all plan to hire remotely this decade

~90% of the workforces we’ve spoken to never want to be in an office again full-time
Async by default: is the thing that organizations are struggling with most

The majority of companies have replicated the office remotely and it is causing strains that are beginning to show
Personal injury: These are exploding. Companies haven’t moved quickly enough to prevent them and back, neck and repetitive strain injuries are becoming a huge problem

Expect this to remedy this quickly by providing better, ergonomic equipment to workers
Universal problems: doesn’t matter the size of the organization, every company is dealing with the same thing

We spoke to early-stage companies, publicly listed tech companies, through to legacy incumbents with hundreds of thousands of employees

All will be more remote
Pollution reduction: many companies we’ve spoken to care massively about the environmental impact that eradicating the office – and the commute – will have

108 million tons of Co2 less every year
Quality of life: even more importantly companies are realizing that they don’t need to expect workers to waste 2 hours a day commuting to sit in an office chair for 8 hour

Almost every company we talk to believes that their workers will be happier as a result of remote work
Remote pressure: a few companies we’ve spoken to have decided to be more remote than they initially intended because their competitors already did it

There is a fear inside companies that if they don’t go remote they will lose their best people to their competitors
Remote fear: most companies aren’t scared about the quality of work that will be produced

They are scared about intangible things they can’t measure ‘quality of communication’ && ‘collaboration in person’ && ‘water cooler chat’

Many have realized these were excuses
Output over time: the measure of performance in the office is how much time you spend sat in your seat

The measure of performance while working remotely has to become output. Tools that enable this to be tracked more accurately are something we are asked for a lot
Written over spoken: documentation is the unspoken superpower of remote teams. The most successful team members remotely will be great writers

Companies are searching for ways to do this more effectively. Tools that enable others to write better will explode
Flattened orgs: middle management is in trouble, an unnecessary bottlenecks which serve no tangible purpose inside async organizations

Companies need coaching and facilitators to maximize organizational effectiveness
Company Resorts: Several companies are thinking about creating resort like compounds where work happens in person

Expect these to be built in incredible locations and focussed on providing the best on-site experience possible
Remote Laws: Many companies are beginning to operate under the assumption that the choice to work remotely will become a legal right

This will give workers the option to choose where they work, and many companies are acting before they are forced
Meeting Death: Wasting 2 hours traveling to a meeting will end. The benefits of in-person are eroded by the benefits of not traveling

Conferences and quarterly networking events will become more important for cultivating in-person relationships
Internal community: Team cohesion and company culture isn’t impossible remotely – but it’s very different

In the same way companies are finally realizing the power of community externally – internal community may become even more important to a companies success