PwC Plans to Track Employees’ Working Locations in Hybrid Crackdown – will this be the best way?
As more companies make moves to tighten up office attendance rules, People Management asks experts whether it will really work in practice.
News Desk London: Professional services giant PwC has told its staff it will begin monitoring where they work following a shift in its hybrid working policy, firming up expectations around working in the office.
According to the Guardian, it emailed its 26,000 staff last week to tell them that, from January, it would start tracking how often employees work from home in the same way it tracks how many chargeable hours they work.
Under the new policy, partners and staff will have to spend a minimum of three days a week-60 per cent of time-with clients or in office. Currently, the rule is to spend two days in office or with clients.
Also, the Financial Times said that every month, each employee will have more detailed information on their “individual working location data, which also flows to PwC’s career advisers.
Laura Hinton, managing director at PwC, said in a press statement: “Face-to-face working is hugely important to a people business like ours, and the new policy tips the balance of our working week into being located alongside clients and colleagues.”
This feels right for our business and right for our people, given our focus on client service, coaching, and learning and development. Meanwhile, we continue to offer flexibility through hybrid working. A Wider Move to Office Working?
It is not the first to nudge staff back towards the office more regularly and monitor their compliance after having shifted towards hybrid working during the pandemic. In response to a lack of compliance with its hybrid working guidelines, earlier this year law firm EY started monitoring its employees’ office attendance through swipe card entry.
Besides that, Santander ordered office-based staff last week to come in for at least three days on average every week.
By contrast, business secretary Jonathan Reynolds has welcomed the shift to working from home as good for the economy because more people were “happy at home” and therefore more productive.
Is PwC’s New Policy the Best Strategy?
How do companies balance the need for personal collaboration with flexibility that employees have grown to love? How would this policy impact employee satisfaction and retention?
Kate Palmer, employment services director at Peninsula, told People Manager that all employees would react differently to such news because each of them has a “different view” of the ideal place for doing work.
Some employees prefer working from home since it may save them time and money on commuting, meaning they have more time for other commitments,” she says. “For them, having to work more from the office may not be welcomed, and it could encourage them to look for roles elsewhere at organisations that allow them to continue working from home.
However, this might not be everyone’s point of view. Other people working in the office environment would appreciate the social interaction and communication advantages that it would accrue; hence, for them, this may be a move that they would have welcomed.
Similarly, Katy Foster, director of people strategy at Cream HR, comments: “For those that value remote work this is definitely going to be challenging, especially if they have made plans such as care arrangements around more remote work.
Overall, however, it is not impossible that employee satisfaction retention may improve. When the company culture is good and colleagues get along well with their teams, there have been benefits seen of face-to-face working.
However, Foster adds that PwC needs to be flexible in this arrangement so that if employees need to attend specific events or appointments or occasionally be at home on particular days, the “company endeavours to enable this”.
According to AdviserPlus’ HR business partner, Jane Bradshaw-Jones: “More in-office days raise crucial questions about how this will impact employee satisfaction and retention. It’s key to learn about the impact of such a shift both on morale and HR.
The shift to remote and to more in-office work could have huge implications for morale among workers who have appreciated the option of working from home. For some, remote work might come with great advantages, such as reduced commuting stress or greatly improved work-life balance.
She says that a “sudden and compulsory return” to most of the week in the office, before these issues are addressed, may result in dissatisfaction, extra pressure, and-added financial burden in some cases.
Prioritise Productivity Over Presenteeism
This according to Daniel Wheatley, reader in business and labour economics at the University of Birmingham Business School, said: “The decision by PwC is by no means unique but rather one of the most common applications of hybrid working routines.
He further says that the effects of this policy might vary depending on how it will be implemented: “If the focus is on reaping benefits from collaborative activities and strengthening relationships among staff, avoiding potential risk of isolation and associated negative wellbeing effects that can occur with remote work, then this transition may be relatively smooth, and that employees actually find the change provides stability in working routines while retaining a level of location-based flexibility.
However, Wheatley warns that if the emphasis falls on monitoring of compulsory attendance and “pushing agendas” around employee visibility and “it being noticed” whether or not people are in the office, the approach may foster presenteeism and cause division among employees.
He continues to say that this approach can have a very negative impact on productivity since “employees expend effort to resist organisational control such that they can retain a level of autonomy in their working routines.”
Working from home is neither “inherently good or bad”, says Sandi Wassmer, chief executive of enei. When considering working arrangements organisations should consider the needs of individual employees, the needs of the business and the interplay between these,” she says.
She adds that organizations should focus more on productivity rather than presenteeism: “If you have the right culture and processes in place and trust your staff, it shouldn’t matter if they’re working from the office or at home.”
“Of course, there does need to be an expectation that people will come together in person to collaborate where necessary, but these decisions should be grounded in business needs and not attempts to control your employees.”
However, Zinc chief executive officer and co-founder Luke Shipley says it is telling that such a large company “clamping down” in this way on time spent in the office demonstrates that “trust can be harder to sustain in bigger workforces”.
PwC deciding to share both chargeable hours and location data makes clear the value they place on time spent face to face, but it’s most powerful when employees also buy into this,” he says.
Flexibility Should ‘Go Both Ways’
Claire McCartney, policy and practice manager at the CIPD said: “CIPD evidence suggests that organisations engaged in hybrid working typically rate the performance of employees from home positively. They also recognise the key benefits such as attraction and retention, employee satisfaction and business flexibility.”
Yet some business leaders have raised concerns that the shift to more home and hybrid working is leading to a disconnection from organization purpose and the culture of the organization.
She adds: “Employers should be seeking to find a balance, where flexibility over where and when people work meets the needs of employees, without compromising the needs of the business.”
McCartney believes organizations need to be more “creative” in their thinking around the kinds of flexible working options available to support a high proportion of employees who do not work in offices or frontline.
Besides, Bradshaw-Jones adds that flexibility should work both ways: “While in-person work has advantages, the current economic climate points to employee retention as crucial. Businesses need to take a collaborative approach with management and employees together involved in transitioning.
A survey among employees before implementing changes would have been useful, providing insight into feelings in the workforce and helping to make decisions more in tune with business needs and staff.
Aliya Vigor-Robertson, co-founder of JourneyHR, said that with the policy coming into play next year, PwC should expect an increase in flexible working requests where employees will ask for different working arrangements based on their needs. “I would encourage PwC to explain the process and to have a transparent decision-making process,” she says.
Stay tuned, to PropleManager.co.in for further updates on the evolving workplace paradigm.
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