Managing Employee Satisfaction in a Hybrid Workplace: 8 Tips

Onsite, Remote, or Hybrid Work Arrangements

What started as a temporary move for many businesses when the pandemic hit has been cemented as a standard practice for many now. Not only do employees prefer hybrid workplace environments, but employers have quickly embraced the concept. While a little more than one-quarter of employees anticipate never returning to the office, most do—or have. 

Per a survey conducted last fall, 30% of those who went remote during the pandemic and jettisoned their workspaces in corporate offices had returned to their previous on-premises workplace arrangements. Almost 40% had not done so but expected to do so later in the year. And while the Omicron variant surge prompted many employers to delay a return to a corporate workplace, the expectation is that most will have moved beyond a 100% remote work model within several months. 

But getting them into a 5-day-a-week, 8-hour-a-day fixed workspace is going to be difficult in most instances. 77% of workers in the same survey said they do not want to return to working onsite full time. This study is not an outlier; all other studies on topic reveal similar findings. Another study found that nearly 4 in 10 workers would quit before returning to the office full time. This report is not an outlier; all other studies on topic reveal similar findings.

Ascent of the Hybrid Workplace

Thus, while the majority of businesses will return to an onsite office format, many are not going to mandate a return to pre-pandemic norms where workers were expected to commute to an on-premises workspace five days a week. Hybrid work is seen as the way of the future by many. Hybrid work combines remote work options with on-premises work arrangements where workers spend part of the week working from home offices and other remote workplaces and the remainder of the week from an onsite workplace. 

As organizations and workers embrace a hybrid workplace arrangement, organizations need to ensure their employees remain satisfied and engaged. Following are tips that employers can implement to do so:

Get a Chat Tool

Business chat tools are critical to collaboration for many organizations. These tools, whether Slack, Microsoft Teams, or others, have supplanted email as the primary communications method in many organizations. Responses are rapid and seamless, both internally and externally, and typically create deeper, more long-term relationships. As chat tools can be customized in various ways, they enable businesses to embed their culture and brand—from the look and feel of the deployment to the use of emojis. These contribute to the ongoing satisfaction of employees.

Use a Project Management Tool

Inefficient project management can be detrimental for a business of any size. It slows down the delivery of projects while increasing cost. Without the right project management workflows and tracking, it is difficult to keep track of project status, maintain a clear order of individual tasks and to whom each is assigned, and track document collaboration and communications—internally and externally. The good news is that there are effective and largely inexpensive project management tools available to even the smallest business—Basecamp, Monday.com, Asana, and others. 

Manage Tasks Effectively

Project management tools are great for initiatives involving multiple professionals and teams. But for professionals in hybrid workplaces, many require more granular task management. This is where task tools like Todoist and Meistertask are useful; they offer low overhead and are simple and easy to use.

Provide Secure Content Collaboration and Sharing

Professionals need an effective means for sharing, collaborating, and storing content. Failure to demonstrate appropriate security protections for the content—whether at risk, in motion, or in use—can create significant risk. Lack of governance and reporting around issues such as users, applications, and storage more can create regulatory compliance challenges.

Use Video Conferencing

Having a great video conferencing tool that offers the capabilities for workers when they are onsite and remote is critically important. There is a long list of video conferencing tools that can be deployed and used quickly and easily. Video conferencing tools include numerous collaborative capabilities that make it easier for those working in hybrid workplaces to work in different settings—onsite and remote.

Use Coworking Space and Day Offices

Some businesses downsized physical real estate—with some even eliminating it—during the pandemic. As a result, even if they mandate a full return to workers onsite five days a week, eight hours a day, those businesses do not have the workspace to do so. Plus, after experiencing remote work as a result of the pandemic, many workers are unwilling to return onsite full time. Coworking space and day offices from global providers like Davinci Meeting Rooms are a great option. Additionally, for those unable to work from their home office, a nearby coworking space or day office offers a professional workplace without a lengthy commute. 

Leverage a Rented Meeting Room

A great meeting room is a requisite for both internal and external meetings—from an employee all-hands event to a client meeting, to a project update. Rented meeting rooms from providers like Davinci Meeting Rooms offer businesses of all sizes professional meeting space that can be rented by the hour, half day, or full day. They all come with lobby greeters, catering services, video conferencing, and collaboration and presenter tools. 

Meet with the Team Members Regularly

Hybrid workplaces require regular status updates and team members need to meet with their managers weekly. These check-ins are important to ensure individual workers remain engaged and succeed. Some of the different technology tools mentioned above provide managers with a means for tracking and directing their works to success during these one-on-one meetings. 

Ensure Work-Life Balance

Hybrid workplace arrangements can result in work-life imbalances, where workers feel lonely, alienated, and are not engaged with other members of the team. Managers need to keep tabs on their hybrid workplace employees during their weekly one-on-one meetings to ensure work does not creep into personal lives and that burnout does not become a problem.  

Managing Employee Satisfaction in Hybrid Workplaces

Hybrid workplaces were a reality before the pandemic. Yet, many businesses were reluctant or completely opposed to embracing hybrid work—even for a select number of employees—beforehand. However, when most organizations were thrust into remote work arrangements two years ago, they discovered many of their fears were ill-founded. Workers were actually more productive. At the same time, recruiting and retaining top talent became easier; spending hours commuting to an onsite workspace five days a week was no longer a requirement. 

Notwithstanding, hybrid workplaces do come with their challenges. This is where a short checklist like the above is important for businesses to keep in mind—which helps them to sustain continued employee satisfaction.

About Patrick Spencer

Patrick Spencer (Ph.D.) is the President and Founder of TIRO Communications that helps companies develop, build, and manage content, customer, advocacy, and demand-gen programs. Included in its offerings is TIRO Cognition Insights, a data analytics tool that enables B2C and B2B businesses to pinpoint what their customers and competitors’ customers are saying and to identify corresponding actionable product, services, competitive, sales, and marketing intelligence. LinkedIn Profile: LinkedIn Website: www.tirocommunications.com