I do not hide it, I have never been a fan of teleworking. Even in June 2020, when we praised its virtues, I felt uneasy. Without really knowing why, instinctively, I was preoccupied.
Posted yesterday at 11:00 a.m.
Today, I’m told our office is one of the liveliest downtown. We are not a big team, maybe it is easier. We did not impose an obligation of a number of days, we did not demonize telework, but we talked about all that human contact could bring us. We organized even more opportunities to cross paths and interact in the office. And above all, we set the example. We are here. Our managers are there. And the snowball effect operates. At the beginning, we were four or five diehards and, little by little, the office filled up again. Action, life, the informal, spontaneity attract and retain. Not everyone is back. This is not a requirement, but a desire. An ambition.
However, for the past few weeks, I have felt against the current of what is conveyed in the media.
But I persist and sign. Because I am worried about the general effect of teleworking on our whole society.
I find it pernicious for us, individually: for our mental health, for our ability to ventilate and bond with our colleagues, for the elimination of that clear boundary between work and home, for the transition times between meetings that no longer exist, for the difficulty of meeting mentors, for the lack of organic mutual aid. For our need to belong to something collective. For this opportunity to trip as a group and contribute to finding solutions as a team, to develop our ingenuity, our intuition and our confidence. For our openness to the world, our acceptance of difference — the fact of going out less of the house risks causing a withdrawal into oneself.
I find it risky for many professionals. When executives or managers return to the office more and only certain resources decide to follow suit, who will have the best connections? Who will have the most information? Who will still be in the conversation when the hybrid meeting screen closes? Who will be asked to work on the most interesting cases? I am worried about the impact that too much teleworking could have on young people, parents or those who prefer to avoid traffic.
More importantly, I am concerned that women, more often than men, choose this way of working. I understand certain benefits, but I am concerned about the insidious consequences that this choice will have on the place of women within organizations, particularly the largest ones.
And businesses too are likely to suffer. What will happen to their ability to mobilize, to create a culture, to train the youngest, to integrate new employees, to be creative? What will happen to the necessary informal conversations in the bend of a hallway and, therefore, the precious opportunities for employers to take the pulse of their world, to resolve tensions between colleagues, to encourage collaboration, spontaneous ideas, mutual aid, friendship and the pleasure of working on a difficult team project?
Not to mention the damage to our cities: for the synergy between different companies and industries, for the ideas that emerge through chance encounters between ecosystems that are not alike. Moreover, Edward Gleaser, professor of economics at Harvard, stated the importance of these interactions for cities by this idea, called ” collision rate that cities grow and flourish because they allow for those unplanned contacts that are the cradle of creativity and innovation.
Finally, we cannot ignore the fact that teleworking jeopardizes urban vitality, because this new mode creates a significant reduction in traffic in our small businesses and restaurants, which are the lungs of our neighborhoods.
What effects will teleworking have on us in the long term? Because with telework, my impression is that the “we” exist less. I know people like to work from the comfort of their home. We have said it over and over again: the disappearance of the journey, the calm of our home, the proximity to the children and so on; it all seems flawless. Yet I am convinced that this isolation carries risks that we are only just beginning to feel.
In fact, after two years of pandemic and disruption of the world as we knew it, it is not telecommuting or hybrid work that we should be talking about, but flexibility, indulgence and understanding.
We are no longer in the era of a single rule for all. Being a boss in 2022 means exercising empathetic leadership and trying to adapt, as much as possible, to everyone’s realities.
So, despite the trend and what the news has taught us over the past few weeks, my love of human contact and my certainty of its importance prevail.
I am convinced that we are winners to be together most of the time. I am convinced that we need a rich and regular contact between us. Because a company, an organization, an industry, a city, a community is much more than screens. It’s human!