Presentation Script

Video-

According to a 2009 study published in the European Journal of Social Psychology, it takes

18 to 254 days for a person to form a new habit.
The study also concluded that, on average, it takes 66 days for a new behaviour to become
automatic.
And there is research that agrees with this number and there is research that does not. It does
not matter though, because we have spent way more time working from home, and it may be
safe to say that either our body or our mind or both may be set in its new ways.
If you have ever said and tried – “I will wake up at 5 am from now on”, “I will work out
every day”, “I will binge watch less”
You know what we are talking about!
And that is what HR teams today are dealing with – a cocktail of Fear of stepping out,
Excitement of meeting everyone again, Anxiety of leaving the couch and more.
So, what could they do?
87 survey responses, 15 personal interviews and lot of secondary research later, we sure have
found some answers.
At this point of time, if you think that a hybrid arrangement of work is the solution to
everything, we want to believe that it is not!
PPT-
As part of our research, we collected responses from 88 professionals, the demographics of
whom you see on your screen, and tried to gauge their apprehensions as well as expectations
in coming back to offices.
Next slide
Close to 50% of them stated being uncomfortable in returning to the old ways of working or
were neutral.
We wonder if safety was the key concern for all of them?
Of course, there is ample evidence and stories that talk about the impact covid pandemic has
had on the mental well-being of people all across, and safety is a key matter.
Next slide
What you see now are some excerpts from the interviews and conversations we had with
working professionals. With all of them sharing the safety concern.
On further trying to understand how can companies and HR in particular help mitigate these
fears, here’s what we found.
Next slide
We gave our respondents an exhaustive list of safety measures that if ensured would make
them comfortable with returning. The top 5 among them being complete vaccination, deep
night cleaning of premises, wearing masks and temperature checks.
Now you might ask that most organizations already have these in place and sure they do. But
instead of stopping at this point we decided to delve deeper and actually understand that if
safety was the only concern, it would have been much easier to call back employees.
Next slide
So, what next after safety? During our secondary research we found that as per a US
survey 42% of employees would quit if their company didn’t offer remote working options
long term. Yet another survey conducted by Future Forum stated that flexibility now ranks
second to compensation with regards to job satisfaction.
Many employees liberated from lengthy commutes and journey have located greater efficient
approaches to spend that time, loved extra flexibility in balancing their private and expert
lives.
Next slide
These findings were reinforced in our primary research as well wherein the respondents
expressed losing flexibility and the comfort of working from home if called back to offices.
This being a shared response across professionals of varied work experiences.
Next slide
Now you might say that we know the solution to this is a hybrid working model. Sure, it is
and many companies have already adopted it. Google, Ford, Spotify being the cases in point.
But now lets just take this a step further and understand how can HR in particular help make
this transition of work from office to work from home to hybrid work environment easier and
stress free for both the employees and organization.
Next slide
Everything starts with a why- They should look to answer questions such as why is it
important to have full employee strength in office? Probably if you are a manufacturing unit
its justified but what about other industries? What are the advantages of returning to
workplace?
Next slide
Psychological safety- While the senior management may want people to come back but it is
also important to understand the feelings of the employees. Ensure their concerns are heard
and addressed.
Herein HR can do sensitivity trainings with the management.
Next slide
Room for emotional ambivalence- While managers and Executives feel ready to work mostly
from the office, they need to acknowledge and make room for emotional ambivalence as a
part of the return journey.

Next slide
Testing 1,2,3- This refers to a phased-out plan of return to office. Doing a pilot and calling in
few employees while ensuring that there onboarding is smooth. Carrying out pulse surveys to
understand their sentiments and addressing their concerns.
Patch to quit- According to McKinsey’s Women in Workplace report 2020, 40 percent of mothers
and 27 percent of fathers spent an additional three or more hours daily on childcare and housework.
Good or bad, this is the new status quo for a lot of households and disturbing this balance will take
its own time.

These were some of the recommendations from our end.

Thank you.