During the COVID lockdown we celebrated and lauded the members of essential services like doctors and health workers. The least recognized service was that of the Information Technology (IT) industry, who silently retreated into working from home mode, but was the actual backbone of all government services, financial and banking services, healthcare services and transport services. Every message, email, website, software, banking, worked without a glitch, just because the IT industry did not go into a pause during the lockdown. It showed how resilient the IT industry is, even at the most adverse of times. While the world is slowly waking back to normal, with all educational institutions, government offices, financial institutions, travel and tourism services, food and hospitality services and healthcare services back to working from office mode, IT is still contemplating whether to completely switch to Work from office. It is a time when IT think-tanks are weighing the benefits of hundred percent working from home, hundred percent working from office and hybrid working model and we have mixed responses.

What is hybrid working model?

A working model in which the employees can work from home for a chosen period in a week or month and work from office for the remaining days of the week or month is known as a hybrid work model. Many IT companies have officially switched to this model, but certainly not without a few glitches and of course with few benefits.

Benefits of hybrid work model

1.       Employee friendliness – Recently, a small meme circulated in Linkedin, which stated “Happiness of working from home is to see the smile of your kid when he comes back from school to see you”. This effectively captures the reason why majority employees look forward to a working from home option. Child and elderly care are important for men and women alike and if employees are given an option for that support for atleast few days a week, they would happily embrace it and consider the organization as employee-friendly.

2.       Focussed work – now that since most of the other services are back to working from the office model, the only ones who would be remaining at home would be the IT professionals. This creates a calm and distraction-free environment which ensures more focus on work. Since there is no direct employee contact, it also reduces the office rumours and grapevine.

3.       Better employee relations – Hybrid work model avoids the monotony of all employees working together daily, hence avoiding the conflicts that can arise. Employees are refreshed from their monotony when they take a break for working from home.

4.       Financial benefit – Employees can save on the expenses incurred for commuting to office daily, while organizations can cut down on the space and amenities expenditure incurred if all employees are working from office daily.

5.       Better social economy – Since the world is back to normal, if IT alone remains aloof at home, it will pull down the IT-Dependent services economy. Atleast if few days a week if the IT is up and running from office premises, it will boost the IT-enabled services.

Challenges of hybrid work model

1.       Poor collaborations – When employees get the autonomy to choose the days in which they work from office, different members of the same team may result in working from office on different days resulting in communication gaps. When 2 or more of the same team members meet at the office, official and unofficial meetings happen, which might not get communicated to others who were not present at the office. This will result in poor collaboration and may lead to conflict at times.

2.       Poor work-life balance- Though many have mastered the art of balancing work and life when working from home, majority have failed to do so. For them, the office hours have blurred away into personal hours leading to deteriorating health and personal life. In such cases, office productivity may seem to increase when it is hundred percent working from home and it will seem to decrease when switched to hybrid work model, but work-life balance might have gone for a toss there.

3.       Question of Trust – There is a small fraction of IT employees who misuse the benefit of working from home by either whiling away time or by “moonlighting” wherein they indulge in other profitable jobs, sometimes even with rivals. The element of trust is lost in such cases which will strain employee-employer as well as employee-employee relationships.

4.       Financial constraint –For employees whose home location is far from the office location, travelling to office for just a few days of the week or month will be a financial burden. Food and accommodation expenses will add on to it. For organizations, arranging for office facilities for a few days of the week or month and home facility facilities to ensure cyber security for the remaining days of the week or month, would be an additional expense.

5.       Less rapport among employees – Since members of the teams are constantly connected online, they share a rapport among themselves, but miss out on other employees of the office. It results in less bonding and rapport among the larger group of employees in an office.

The key to solve this puzzle is to identify measures so that the benefits outweigh the challenges. It is said that the first six months of a marriage have the most problems and if the marriage patiently withstand the first six months, it will last longer. So, when we are trying to marry off working from home to working from office, we should embrace ourselves for the initial hiccups and withstand them through the initial days, so that it lasts longer.