The homebound hustle

Nearly five years later on February 6, 2025, all federal employees were ordered to report back to work in person. The work from home gig was up. This, however, is not so for those toiling away in the private sector as the lingering effects of the COVID upheaval march on.

A workplace is a well-designed and organized entity where co-workers collaborate to be productive, but COVID did its best to change such a time-honored tradition.

Before the COVID overseas invasion, about 3% of the Geisinger health system’s staff worked from home. Five years later it’s nearly 20%. In a recent release Geisinger fumbled the option saying, “At this time, we gave employees the option to return to the office, remain working from home or choose a hybrid model. Many of our non-clinical employees embraced the option to stay working remotely.”

Remote work is not the golden goose many proclaim it to be. The time to rock the remote boat is overdue where collared shirts and slacks were swapped for slippers and shorts.

It is hard to coordinate a collective effort when employees are not at the same venue. There may be ten things to distract you from work but there are 100 at home. Working remotely ignores human nature where distractions are a productivity killer.

The research is as long as it is thorough. One study said employees arebetween 10 and 20% less productive than when they are in the office. Another study revealed 41% of remote workers felt stressed compared to only 25% of those in the office. Forty-two percent had trouble sleeping, while only 29% of office workers reported the same.

Remote workers are less likely to form new connections spending less time pooling resources with colleagues as interpersonal relationships suffer. This was underscored in a 2021 study of 61,000 Microsoft employees in the journal “Nature Human Behaviour” recounted how communication and collaboration decreased, while anxiety and depression compounded.

It was not just the employees who felt the effects as a Middle Market Business Index report released in 2023 found that 64% of executives identified remote work-related mental health issues with nearly three-quarters of executives reporting employees’ feeling isolated.

The established office culture of building relationships with colleagues cannot be overstated as younger employees learn from senior colleagues on job performance, managing a crisis, taking criticism, and celebrating successes. You don’t learn that by doing that second load of laundry and walking the dog.

Rather, they remain lounging in their shorts imbibing on their favorite after hours beverage in their oversized coffee mug with their feet propped up on their coffee table taking in a Zoom meeting and as P.J. O’Rourke would quip, “where no one can smell their breath.”

Going out for lunch means moving from your living room to the kitchen. A 20-second office exchange becomes a never-ending “reply all” misconstrued email where a lack of human connection and poorly defined boundaries only adds to the frustration experienced on both ends of the workplace equation.

It is nearly impossible to train and develop staff remotely by brainstorming through a series of emails or on Zoom. The results only erode corporate culture and where a genuine sense of teamwork is lost amongst people you have never met or managed through personal oversight.

Likewise, remote employees use a variety of technological devices to access their organization’s network, which only escalates cybersecurity risks.

A successful company cannot compete purely with employees anchored at home who rarely meet or even know each other.

No one ever said corporate America is rational. In these post-pandemic times, the balance of power has shifted from employers to employees.

Rather, those who must work on-site are bombarded with a never-ending string of emails and phone calls from the homebound posse requiring confirmation as soon as they click send or leave a message.

These are the same folks who once had an office on site where their cubicles now collect dust and where any request for even a modest hybrid work arrangement that would greatly improve efficiency only falls on tin ears.

In our post-COVID world, the pendulum of remote work in the private sector needs to swing back—now.