Hybrid Work : The hybrid workforce is here to stay. And while combining in-person and remote work has its pitfalls, done right can bring significant benefits, as these IT leaders attest.
Almost all studies and reports have confirmed it: the business world will now work in a hybrid way.
This change is already underway, putting managers to the test who must now remodel office space and reorganize teams.
But the hybrid environment is already showing positives, especially in the realm of IT, where CIOs have found some surprising benefits from having more flexible policies on where and when their employees work.
“The change has provided us with a springboard to pioneer new ways of working, completely rethink our roadmaps and reinvent collaboration as we navigate the unknown together,” says Meta CIO Atish Banerjea.
Of course, not all executives have experienced the benefits of hybrid work; And those CIOs who have seen the benefits of hybrid working say they must now manage their departments in new ways to maintain and maximize those benefits for the long term.
That’s worth doing, IT leaders agree, noting the following 10 benefits of hybrid working that have improved their teams, their IT operations, and ultimately their organizations.
1. The End Of The Persistent Stigma Of Remote Work
Brad Stone, CIO of Booz Allen Hamilton, had one of his top IT infrastructure workers move away from the company’s offices during the pandemic. The worker told Stone that he believed he couldn’t have made the move before COVID because he had feared working remotely would put him at a disadvantage.
Now, employers and employees alike are more likely to view fully or partially remote workers as just as engaged as others. “It’s opened up the possibility for people to work where they really want to be and to do it in a way that doesn’t hurt their career path.”
2. A Boost For Recruitment And Retention
After years of fierce competition for IT talent, CIOs are enjoying a bit of relief as many have been able to eliminate, or at least ease, geographic requirements for new hires and existing workers.
Most others have endorsed this idea. About 94% of respondents to the 2021 Global Hybrid Workplace Survey from tech companies Riverbed and Aternity said hybrid work helps recruit talent.
3. A Slowdown In The Growth Of Workers’ Compensation
On a related note, the ability for IT employees to work from anywhere has eased some of the upward pressure on talent costs, says Dan Albright, president and global head of consulting at NTT DATA Services.
4. Increased Productivity
IT managers say they and their teams have enjoyed increased productivity in the hybrid world. They point out that remote employees can get more work done because they don’t experience the interruptions typical of an office environment. Additionally, teams can meet more quickly, whether online or in a hybrid meeting, helping reduce the time people need to physically get to and from meetings.
5. “Retrofit” Opportunities
Remote and hybrid working gives CIOs the opportunity to reconfigure teams based more, or even exclusively, on the necessary set of complementary skills rather than proximity, according to IT advisors.
Now, with people remote, a collaboration between different offices and different countries has increased exponentially. You can look for a skill set wherever you reside,” says Samir Datt, Managing Director of Protiviti’s technology consulting practice.
6. And Opportunities To Balance The Workload
Similarly, some CIOs have found that the hybrid model and the flexibility it brings to workers’ schedules allow them to extend the workday without having to add staff, require workers.
7. Meetings That Work For Everyone
Like most professionals before the pandemic, Fuze’s Conry remembers what hybrid meetings used to entail: workers meeting in a conference room where they often held parallel discussions to advance ideas while remote workers were marginalized and excluded.
8. Improved Communication Skills
Jim A. Jorstad and his leadership at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse found that the move to virtual and then hybrid work limited informal and impromptu opportunities to talk with their workers.
He and his managers were forced to be more effective presenters, more attentive to understanding nonverbal cues, and more deliberate in engaging people.
9. More Commitment And Empathy With Teammates
Several CIOs say that hybrid working forces them and their bosses to be more deliberate in soliciting feedback and input from employees since they weren’t all in one place at the same time. This, in turn, has helped increase overall engagement.
As Banerjea explains: “We learned time and time again that empathy and collaboration with all colleagues are essential to building the future of work and beyond. We enabled rapid sentiment surveys across the company to get feedback from our people on a regular basis. and determine the most important needs to be productive and how we can address those challenges. We intentionally create opportunities and products that drive human connection so that whether someone joins 100% remotely, partially remotely, or in person, they feel equally connected. with our people and our culture.
10. Promotion For The CIO, IT Crew, Also All Effort
As CIOs and their teams rapidly delivered the technologies that enable the highly digital, hybrid work environments prevalent in many organizations, they gained new allies and a stronger voice within their own companies.
