Remote work is no longer an option for many companies as 2023 saw the end of this policy for companies like Disney and Starbucks. Most companies decided that employees should now return to work.
Employees were not happy but had little choice. But going forward it looks like companies with flexible work policies are growing much faster than those which require their employee to be in the office full-time. This was according to findings by The Flex Index which collects office requirements for more than 4,500 companies with 30,000 locations.
The Hiring Problem
According to the report companies that are flexible added jobs and employees two times faster than companies that required full-time employees.
Even if the company allows two or three days of working from home, it is already good enough for it to have grown more quickly.
A simple example shows that companies that required employees to come in on specific days grew in head count at 4.6% a year. Fully flexible companies grew 4.5% while full-time in office companies grew 2.1%.
Also the research shows that not all hybrid arrangements work. Companies that allow one to three in the office grew much faster than those that required four or five.
“Once you start getting closer to full-time in office, requiring four or five days, I think there’s a bright line starting to emerge for employees and for your ability to attract talent,” says Sadow.
It is important however to note that headcount growth does not always mean the company is financially healthy. But generally companies that are hiring does mean that they are growing.
The main reason for this trend being likely to continue is because flexibility allows people to move closer to family and to cities that are more affordable and that is unlikely to change in the near future.
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The photo above is from Wikipedia