Anne-Laure Fayard

John Weeks

Mahwesh Khan

<article-ideainbrief class="article-ideainbrief">
 <h4 class="ideainbrief-title">Idea in Brief</h4>
 <div class="ideainbrief-contents">
  <h5>The Problem</h5>
  <p>Remote work is delivering some near-term productivity boosts and cost savings, but the longer-term impact may be very negative for company performance.</p>
  <h5>Why That Is</h5>
  <p>Human beings require personal connection to build trust. Learning through observation requires physical proximity. And chance encounters between diverse individuals are a rich source of innovation.</p>
  <h5>The Solution</h5>
  <p>Tomorrow’s offices will serve primarily as a place to renew social ties, build a learning culture, and offer opportunities for serendipity. They will be designed and managed to foster human connections with the help of technology.</p>
 </div>
</article-ideainbrief><p>In June 2019 the International Olympic Committee (IOC) opened Olympic House, its new headquarters, in Lausanne, Switzerland. Constructed over six years, at a cost of $150 million, the new building was empty within just nine months. IOC staffers, like knowledge workers around the world, were working from home.</p>

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<p>The natural experiment forced on the world by the coronavirus demonstrates that the academics and tech visionaries who have been talking since the 1980s about the possibilities of remote work were not exaggerating. After months of working remotely, we have all learned that most tasks are accomplished and most meetings go just fine without the office.</p>
<p>But that, the authors warn, doesn&#8217;t mean companies should suddenly abandon their workplaces. Going to the office, they argue, has never been just about work. And technology won&#8217;t make socializing less dependent on direct interpersonal contact anytime soon. In this article they describe the important social functions of an office: It&#8217;s where people build trust through personal interaction, learn the nuances of their job, and build and maintain organizational culture. And it&#8217;s through random in-person encounters between people from different functions and cultures that many of the most innovative business ideas are born. The authors conclude by showing how design, technology, and management practices can be used to make tomorrow&#8217;s offices more effective as social, learning, and innovation spaces.</p>

Designing the Hybrid Office

The natural experiment forced on the world by the coronavirus demonstrates that the academics and tech visionaries who have been talking since the 1980s about the possibilities of remote work were not exaggerating. After months of working remotely, we have all learned that most tasks are accomplished and most meetings go just fine without the office. But that, the authors warn, doesn’t mean companies should suddenly abandon their workplaces. Going to the office, they argue, has never been just about work. And technology won’t make socializing less dependent on direct interpersonal contact anytime soon. In this article they describe the important social functions of an office: It’s where people build trust through personal interaction, learn the nuances of their job, and build and maintain organizational culture. And it’s through random in-person encounters between people from different functions and cultures that many of the most innovative business ideas are born. The authors conclude by showing how design, technology, and management practices can be used to make tomorrow’s offices more effective as social, learning, and innovation spaces.

Designing the Hybrid Office

Summary.

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