Memo – Companies Are Starting To Demand Workers Return To The Office, What Will You Do?

I’ve been speaking with corporate executives, human resource professionals, and my high value employee clients, and it seems that Fortune 500 companies are going to start demanding that employees return to work, at least a few days a week, if not full time, starting in the fall.

Smaller companies are thinking of doing the same.

To listen to a related podcast, click here.

Podcast – “Meeting In Person To Get Work Done” Is A Stone Age Technology | Evolve Or Go Extinct

Some of you already are on a split work from the office and work from home schedule.

What if they want you back in the office even more or full time?

What will you do?

It seems to me corporations think they have more leverage than they actually do. So many of us have gotten used to remote working, and some of us have moved too far away from our offices to return to physical work in the office.

Also, many of us have woken up to the fact that commuting two hours per day to work in sterile high rise buildings with unnatural lighting, recirculated air and being forced to be close to mostly polite strangers all day is not worth it.

Younger people are well aware of this and they are demanding a greater work life balance, including working from home. Some see younger people as entitled, but I see them as having a much better perspective in many ways.

So, if your employer demands that, let’s say, you return to the office 3 days a week, or full time, would you comply or would you look for something else?

When I asked this question of my top 20% of performers in their job, such as salespeople and important management, 95% of the time they’re telling me they’re never returning to an office.

You see, since the pandemic and the lockdowns, everyone’s gotten used to remote work.

Just like dating, employment is now an international marketplace. Employers around the world are no longer worried about proximity to an office. They are just looking for the most talented people.

So the more vital that you are to an organization’s success, the less you have to live with a restriction of working in an office.

I think many companies who mandate working at an office are going to be surprised to see that their employees
1) fiercely don’t want be back in an office and
2) have more options than ever today.

Many large cities are dying. We’ve all seen the stories about San Francisco.

Many of them are descending into criminal and homeless chaos. Office occupancy rates are at an all time low.

To quote Pete Townshend of The Who “The Exodus is Here” and I don’t think that the corporations and residents that are fleeing the decaying states and cities are ever going back.

The crime rates are making employees afraid to return. I think this is going to be a big hurdle for companies to overcome. If a company cannot guarantee your safety, they cannot demand you return to an office.

If these large corporations make a work-from-the-office directive, I’m going to see a large uptick in meetings to start new businesses. The benefits of being your own boss are too many to list here.

This year, my meetings related to start-ups have tripled. Most of those seeking out my guidance came from Fortune 500 companies.

Some people have taken their kids out of after school care or fired babysitters. Parents love being close to home in case of an emergency. Families can have dinner together with the parents relaxed as they didn’t just spend 90 minutes on a train or bus or in their car. Parents can take kids to and from the bus stop or drop them off and pick them up from school.

I have gotten used to hearing family related noises on phone calls and during zoom meetings. I think it’s great.

Working at an office constantly under the watchful eye of a manager and your co-workers is no different than being in grade school. Adults don’t need that level of supervision.

And there are many more reasons why working at home is so much better. I think that people will even take a pay cut sometimes to maintain this level of freedom and control of their lives.

This archaic model of forcing employees to live close to cities in order to go to work forces families to pay a very high percentage of their income on housing.

This is no longer required! There are much more family-friendly and affordable places around the country where you can raise your kids and build a life there. Imagine how much money you would save if you could move to a more affordable area.

Also there’s other parts of the world that are even cheaper where you can live and still work remotely.

Remember, there is a global job market now. Foreign companies have no problem with remote work. The need to live close to your employer is quickly fading.

So I think the genie is out of the bottle with regard to remote work.

Are you a key employee? Top salesperson? Important manager? Use that leverage to demand the work environment that is best for you and your family.

Consider moving to a smaller company, or starting your own.

The majority of people that are employees in the United States are working for small companies just like my clients. And these small companies have none of the DEI (Diversity Equity and Inclusion) or ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) issues that the employees of large corporations have to deal with everyday.

So moving from a large to small company has great benefits beyond flexibility and pay.

Are you a seasoned professional with decades of experience? You run the risk of being replaced with someone younger and cheaper, so you may not have as much job security as you believe. It may be time to take your talents to the free market and have hundreds of bosses instead of just one.

Why continue to give the majority of the profit from your labor to a nameless faceless corporation?

So I’d love to hear from you either in the comment section or send me an email. Tell me your story. Are you currently working from home and have you heard that your company is going to require office work again?

Please let me know your thoughts and what you’ll do if that happens.