Amazon recently joined the procession of companies heading towards a hybrid work model, turning their back decisively on a fully-remote work arrangement.
This June, eCommerce company Meesho would be replacing “work from anywhere” with “work from office” but with flexibility built into the new format.
Further down the work landscape, there are companies that had experimented with hybrid models, but are making work synonymous with office, setting the clock back to pre-pandemic times.
Mumbai-based tech company Fynd resumed the five-day office week this year, but not before introducing “inducements”, including perks relating to transport and food, to make the switch back to pre-pandemic work systems palatable.
The return-to-office programme by EY Global Delivery Services is pointedly focussed on making the cubicle an inviting space — efforts include “spinning the wheel of fortune” contests and team visits to sports carnival.
Tarun Kochhar, founder and CEO, Carpediem, notes the “work from anywhere” model was a contingency born out of the pandemic. As the crisis has gone — at least, lost its virulence — the work arrangement it birthed might have to go or continue with changes.
“Going forward a blended model of working from home and office is what will be the way to go,” says Kochhar.
While transitioning to a hybrid work model, companies would soften the blow by first asking employees to put in only two or three days at office. The call back to office has a tone that is more coaxing than commanding.
Efforts to populate the offices are helped by a growing enthusiasm among the workforce to have the office as their primary workspace.
Both Ernst & Young (EY) and L&T Technology Services underline an eagerness among new hires to be working from office.
Abhishek Sinha, chief operating officer and board member at L&T Technology Services, shares that though working entirely from office has not been made mandatory yet at his office, there is a rising trend of engineers wanting to come back to the company’s delivery centres.
“We now have 60-80% of our employees across the centres coming to office on a rotational basis,” says Sinha.
He recalls how the recently-concluded annual awards ceremony at L&T Technology Services — conducted simultaneously across its locations in India and abroad, under the name “Estrellas 2023” — was well-attended, its centres in Bangalore, Mysore, Chennai, Vadodara and Mumbai registering a 90 percent employee turnout.
