The Upside To Being Back At The Office

Do you work in an office? Did you get the dreaded company wide email about the “return to office policy”? I did. And I could not believe my eyes. Every employee is expected to be in the office FOUR DAYS per week! “Four days hardly counts as flexible working” I thought to myself “especially when I can get more done in half the time at home”. What are they thinking? What is the upside to being back at the office?

It was a tough pill to swallow but once I had time to digest it and to spend some time back at the office, I admit there are some upsides to being back there. I still think we are more productive at home and that four days per week is too much. If you are interested you can check out our post The Upside To Working From Home. Right now, we are focused on the upside to being back at the office.

Office Perks

The office perks we get definitely depends on where we work. Broadly speaking though, most offices offer something! We are talking everything the downright basics of free tea, coffee and miserable biscuits all the way to the fully serviced offices. By that we mean catered breakfast, lunch and dinner as well as onsite laundry, personal care such as hairdressers and gym.

My office perks situation falls somewhere in between and I will admit I have to spend less money on groceries and less time preparing breakfast and lunch now that I am back at the office. I hope we all get some perks, I definitely don’t think they are enticing enough to justify being back at the office. However they are worth an honourable mention in the upside to being back at the office conversation.

Social Aspect

As an introvert I’m quite happy working at home alone all day. However, I cannot deny, regular social interaction with my colleagues has an overall positive impact on my mental health. The flexible working model that allows partial in-office and partial work from home allows the best of both worlds.

As humans we are social creatures and we actually need social interaction to survive. Being able to benefit from social interaction by going into the office is really important and honestly something that I didn’t realised I missed it, until I had it back in my life again.

Promotion

So far I’ve focused on non work benefits to being at work. However there are also career upsides to being in the office and one of them is being physically present in the office environment increases your chance of promotion. This BBC article, Why In Person Workers May Be More Likely To Be Promoted investigates this in more detail.

I am not saying it is right, but it is true. Being physically present allows you to showcase your talent and your contribution more easily. Seeing is believing for managers and senior leadership. People promote people they trust. And familiarity increases trust which can be gained simply by being present regularly. People who are out of sight are out of mind at promotion time.

Collaboration

Another upside to being in the office is increased opportunity for collaboration and in particular ad hoc or random collaboration. You know what I mean, when someone says “can I just run an idea really quickly?” and you are still talking 20 minutes later.

There can be a drawback here in terms of time and efficiency however in general the positive work conversations and collaborations that can happen at the office are really beneficial. And they just do not happen in the same way with remote working.

All About Who You Know

As the saying goes “it’s not what you know but who you know”. Whilst those random conversations in the elevator or at the coffee machine may seem pointless, we are actually building relationships and getting to know people. And knowing someone on a personal level from face to face interactions, is very valuable to us.

Firstly it means that when you have a problem or need a favour you actually know who can help. And secondly, it means that you are more likely to have the relationship that gives you permission to ask for help or to fast track to what you need just by virtue of who you know. We simply don’t get to know or trust the same amount of people when we only work through a screen.

*Dogs

I have a star on this one as I understand that all offices are not dog friendly. But ours is. And I also understand that not everyone loves dogs. But I do. So one major upside to being in the office is all of the new furry friends I’ve been able to make since we’ve been back.

Best Of Both

In truth, the flexible working model that allows for some in-office time and some work from home time is the best of both worlds, at least for me. I find that days in the office should be spent collaborating and coordinating with others where possible. Whilst time at home is now reserved for deep work and important solo projects.

As with everything in life working in the office is neither all bad or all good. By choosing to lean into the positives of each, we can gain the most value and work our situation to our advantage. On the contrary concentrating on the negatives will only drag us down, reduce productivity and cause all sorts of problems for ourselves. How many days do you work from the office?