The UK has seen a huge shift over to remote/ hybrid working over the past 18 months and the ICT sector is no exception. Telcos have in the main embraced at least a hybrid option, with many seeing it as an essential offering to their employees in order to ensure retention and new candidate attraction. But is it all it’s cracked up to be?
According to a survey conducted by PWC, productivity has risen since the move to remote/hybrid working. A majority of business leaders said their organisation have performed better against workforce performance and productivity targets over the past 12 months. However, less than two thirds of business leaders are confident they are building high levels of trust between workers and managers.
So, it seems that productivity and performance gains may have come at the expense of longer-term employee trust. Is it an employee’s fault that their leadership team doesn’t trust them just because of where they are working from? Perhaps company bosses need to find a solution for this that enables them to ensure trust levels and productivity are both high.
There is no doubt about it though, giving people the option to work from the office, or at home seems to be working in the main. At neoci, we speak to many hiring managers who say that although they enjoy the social aspect of being in the office, they feel the distractions there mean they are much more productive at home. We also speak to a lot of fully remote candidates, who are generally positive about it. However, one of the biggest concerns they have is being cut off or forgotten about. There is a genuine concern from employees that if they do not have a visible presence in the office, they may be overlooked for that promotion, or not be appreciated in the same way as their office-based colleagues.
Overall, Hybrid appears to be the logical solution. You get best of both worlds, and it makes sense that most telcos who embrace this will be more attractive places to work.
Neoci are specialists in recruiting into tech and telco, for further details visit www.neoci.co.uk