Questioning the virtue of working from home is the new heresy

Employers I know are fed up. They cannot get their staff to come into work.

I exaggerate. One I met last week pronounced himself happy with his lot: the bulk of his workers were at their desks. His claim was borne out during a visit to his central London premises – they were positively buzzing, with plenty of people in evidence. His were unlike some offices I’ve been to recently – and others I’ve passed and glanced through their windows – that have a forlorn, desolate, scarcely there, feel about them.

There is little prospect of that altering, quite the reverse. The government is intent on legislating that on the first day in their new job a worker can seek to work from home or job share or vary their hours.

In theory, the Conservatives are honouring an election manifesto promise and the measure is merely extending the current requirement that an employee must wait six months before asking for flexible working.

In that sense, they argue, it is not such a dramatic step. Certainly, it’s not as radical as that proposed by Labour. The party’s Deputy Leader, Angela Rayner, pledges that “Labour will give workers the right to flexible working – not just the right to request it – and give all workers full rights from day one on the job.” After the pandemic, the “new normal”, says Rayner, “must mean a new deal for all working people based on flexibility, security and strengthened rights at work.”

When the virus hit, working from home became a plank of the Covid response as the government urged Britons to stay indoors. Then, as the UK eased out of lockdown, the official stance was still to advise people to work from home where possible.

Now comes legislation. Kwasi Kwarteng, the Business Secretary, maintains: “Empowering workers to have more say over where and when they work makes for more productive businesses and happier employees.”

In which case, why does the head of Goldman Sachs, David Solomon, decry WFH as an “aberration”? Why does Rishi Sunak warn that working from home can damage young people’s careers?

Another who has vented his frustration is Andrew Monk, chief executive of City investment firm, VSA Capital. He told Radio 4’s Today that people abuse WFH and at least in his industry, financial services, they’re less productive. He cited audits as an example. “What you’ll find is that audit work is taking significantly longer than it used to take, and of course when things take longer, it means they cost more as well, because these people tend to charge by the hour.” The truth, he said, is “although they are all working from home and say it’s all fine, it’s not fine.”

While on its face the proposed statute is not such a departure, said Monk, that is not the point. It is “setting a tone that is almost making people think they can do part-time work but on full-time salaries.”

Brave words from Monk, and from Solomon and, to an extent, Sunak. There would have been lots of bosses nodding their agreement. They will not say anything, though, because the right to flexi-working is akin to woke; to deny it is to be pilloried, to be marked down as a grasping, uncaring dinosaur.

We’ve reached a pivotal point, when employers who create jobs and generate wealth are silenced, afraid to voice the truth. Power is shifting from management to employees.

In some respects that’s a positive. It is the case that for too long some bosses have been abusing their positions, treating workers appallingly, imposing onerous working conditions and scandalous practices. Some, but not all; a minority, not the majority.

Now, though, all employers are expected to unquestioningly accept the proposition that WFH is beneficial – to their workers, their organisations, to the economy. Rather than examine and analyse, and listen to both sides, the reaction from populist, vote-chasing politicians is to play to the gallery and never mind the consequences. From headline-grabbing businesses, too, who see allowing their staff to WFH as a great PR opportunity, that being seen to grant it will validate them as empathetic and progressive.

There are two alarming aspects to this. One is that employers have no voice, they are simply not heeded – even by a Conservative government that is supposed to be their friend. This extends into other areas, beyond WFH. Employers are simply not taken seriously. Their own membership organisations, such as the Confederation of British Industry and Institute of Directors, are toothless, more concerned with macro-affairs and not concerned enough with the practicalities of trying to run a business.

The second is the speed of change. Before the pandemic, WFH was not on society’s radar as an issue of major importance. It was nice to have – an aspiration – but that was about all. Then, along came the virus and the rise of Zoom, and everything altered. Something that a few could achieve, that more enlightened bosses would allow in individual, special circumstances, became a right. Just like that.

We’re not there yet. In theory, management can refuse a request to WFH. But who wants to be the executive who is outed in the media and on social media; hounded, because they said their new hire must come into work?

Walking around our city centres and seeing the empty or only part-filled office buildings is depressing. Can it really be the case that all the energy, interaction, bonding and team building, learning on the job, spontaneity, creativity and thinking that took place in there is now being supplied by WFH, remotely?

It’s not, and to believe home working is an adequate substitute is delusional. One agency chief put it to me when he said WFH translates into out of sight, out of mind. That is not a good place for employee and employer to be.

We’re human beings, we function better together. WFH may appeal, just as being on holiday, not being in the workplace, appeals, but we should not be kidding ourselves: it is no replacement for the real thing.