People now come into the office an average of just 1.4 days a week, resulting in two thirds of office desks being unused.
This compares to nearly four days a week before the Covid-19 pandemic, revealing a seismic shift in working patterns.
The new research by The Advanced Workplace Associates (AWA) Hybrid Working Index study found that if companies have no hybrid working policies, people come in on average less than one day a week.
However even if organisations insist people come in three days a week, the policy doesn’t work as attendance averages just 2.1 days a week.
AWA found that offices in most sectors and locations are under-occupied which, if these trends continue, will result in excess space needing to be re-purposed or sub-let.
Office attendance
Average attendance in offices is just 26 percent, with peaks in the middle of the week of no more than a third of employees in the office.
As evidenced anecdotally – and by AWA’s 2021 survey of how people want to work – employees prefer to be in the office on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday – with 88 percent of people working from home on a Friday.
The UK figures show a slightly higher average and midweek attendance, however Mondays and Fridays are still very empty – with 19 percent and 13 percent attendance on those days.
On average the British employee comes into the office less than 1.5 days a week.
The research also found that people are not complying with their organisations hybrid working policies. Where organisations have stated two, two/three or three days in the office policies, attendance is respectively 1.1 days in the office, 1.6 days in the office and 2.1 days in the office.
However, where an employer trusts individual teams to make their own decisions about office attendance, the average is two days in the office.
Andrew Mawson, managing director of AWA, commented: “What this global survey shows is that as a result of changes due to the pandemic the hybrid working genie is out of the bottle. Even where employers try to force staff into the office two or three days a week, employees don’t comply.
“Organisations need to look at the data showing that two third of desks are unused and work with their employees to find smarter, more efficient ways of working that will fit in with how people want to live their lives, save money and be more environmentally friendly.
”We believe this will have a profound impact on the property market, which is not currently being recognised by the industry.”
Amelia Brand is the Editor for HRreview, and host of the HR in Review podcast series. With a Master’s degree in Legal and Political Theory, her particular interests within HR include employment law, DE&I, and wellbeing within the workplace. Prior to working with HRreview, Amelia was Sub-Editor of a magazine, and Editor of the Environmental Justice Project at University College London, writing and overseeing articles into UCL’s weekly newsletter. Her previous academic work has focused on philosophy, politics and law, with a special focus on how artificial intelligence will feature in the future.
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