"Here's what Canada's business leaders think about heading back to the office"/ "If the way we work is going to change, offices are going to change, too"

Jul. 31, 2021 "Here's what Canada's business leaders think about heading back to the office": Today I found this article by Pete Evans in CBC News:

It's been more than 500 days since millions of Canadian employees were forced to suddenly work from home because of COVID-19.

While the pandemic is far from over, some workplaces are starting to tackle the tough questions of when and whether to come back into the office again — and what work life will look like for people, no matter where they do it.

CBC News reached out to dozens of business leaders across the country for their thoughts on the return to work.

In responses from across Canada, from tiny non-profits with a handful of employees, to tech startups, energy firms and financial giants with tens of thousands of workers, one sentiment was echoed again and again: Things definitely won't be exactly how they used to be.

"It won't be a one-size-fits-all," said Guy Cormier, CEO of the Montreal-based financial services giant Desjardins.

Desjardins doesn't plan on flipping a switch and calling everyone who used to be in the office to come back in. Instead, the company plans to allow for all sorts of arrangements. Many people will come back into the office basically full time, if they want to and it makes sense to, while some former office dwellers will stay at home permanently. Others will adopt the so-called hybrid model, where they switch between the two.

"We will adapt with our staff and be sure that there's … balance between their lives and their work," Cormier said.

It's a similar story at the big banks; both TD and CIBC say they plan to incorporate a lot more work from home into their business from now on.

"The majority of our team can work from anywhere, be productive and do incredible work. But there are also things we do best in person and together," said CIBC's group head of people Sandy Sharman. "The future of how and where they work will blend the best of both worlds."

"We anticipate that colleagues will continue to enjoy more work-life flexibility, including remote work and hybrid options where it is possible. However, we believe that most roles will require some presence in the office, in order to foster collaboration, innovation and strengthening of our culture," said TD's chief human resource officer Kenn Lalonde.

Cenovus Energy will be going the hybrid route, allowing people to work up to two days a week from home — if they want it and if the job realistically allows.

"We're planning to use a hybrid workplace flexibility model — with office staff able to work from home up to two days a week, role permitting," the Calgary-based company's executive vice-president, Sarah Walters, said in an email. "The new model will be implemented in September to coincide with the majority of our office returns and we will be assessing this approach over time to ensure it's the best fit for our workplace."

Hybrid approach

Staffing firm Manpower knows better than most that tailoring the arrangement on a case-to-case basis works best, so that's what they'll be doing with their own employees. "We need to be flexible in order to attract and retain some of the top talent in the market," said Darlene Minatel, Manpower's country manager for Canada.

Marketing agency Brand Momentum will be similarly flexible, but they will require staff to make an appearance in the office in either Toronto or Montreal at least three days a week, said CEO Hesham Shafie.

Insurance giant Sun Life, meanwhile, is open to anything that gets the job done. "We're not imposing any minimum or maximum in terms of being in the office," president Jacques Goulet said. "In fact, we don't talk about return to office — what we're talking about is opening our offices for work."

St John's-based software company Celtx says it plans to proceed with whatever system works best for its employees — and above all, whatever they decide to do, it will roll out slowly. "We're not going to do anything sudden, it'll be done with a lot of consultation," CEO Mark Kennedy said, adding that, ultimately, keeping his employees happy is good for business. "If you have a happy employee, usually you have a productive employee."

Indeed, if there's one lesson the pandemic disruption has taught Canadian business leaders, it's that there can be a better way than what they were doing.

Lessons learned

Celtx employed a good chunk of remote workers even before COVID-19 hit, so the company had a bit of a leg up in terms of making it work for everyone. "We actually leaned on our remote workers to tell people who were used to working in an office what were some of the tips they could employ," Kennedy said. "We just put some of those best practices into use for everyone."

While Brand Momentum will want its staff to be in the office at least part time, Shafie says they have no intention of forcing people back. Far from it; he says working from home has actually made the company more productive.

"Because many of our people were driving half an hour, an hour each way to get to the office, now these two hours they're able to use [that] productivity for the family, for the life. So they're happier as a result," he said. "It's been a transformation."

Ultimately, no company should expect things to go back to how they were before — and any ones that do are likely to suffer for it.

Montreal-based marketing firm helloDarwin plans to go the hybrid route of having office space there for those who want it, home work for others, and a mix-and-match for everyone else. The system has worked well through the pandemic, says CEO Mathieu Plante, so they have no plans to change it.

And he has a warning for any corporate executives who long to get back to the days of valuing face time in the office over everything.

"If an employer cannot accommodate his workforce in 2021, for sure, [they] will see departures, people leaving the company."

Here's what Canada's business leaders think about heading back to the office | CBC News

Nov. 29, 2021 "If the way we work is going to change, offices are going to change, too": Today I found this article by Geoff Nixon on CBC news: 

Communications director Nedjma Belbahri doesn't miss the old days at Square Enix Montréal, before the pandemic pushed everybody home.

That's because she wasn't working for the mobile game developer until after that happened.

"They closed the office on the Friday and I started on the Monday," said Belbahri, rewinding the story back to March 2020.

The company soon shipped computers, chairs and other equipment to its staff so they could set up shop at home. It wasn't an easy shift for everyone, but they made it work.

Today, Square Enix Montréal is a few months into a gradual process of bringing its employees back to the office — with staff consent and with adjustments to how things work there.

"I don't think things need to be the same," Belbahri said. "I think we need to stop hoping to go back [to the way things were] because no one's going to go back."

At organizations across Canada, decision-makers are looking at how their physical workspaces need to function, as they plan how their people will make use of them in the future — even if their staff end up spending less time there in the long term.

In some cases, that's spurring changes to those spaces, including office equipment and infrastructure upgrades, as well as a rethink of the ways people will work there.

'Work is about people'

In September, Square Enix Montréal began allowing its staff to return to its downtown office on a voluntary basis.

Just a handful of people went at first, but that number is slowly ticking upward. Belbahri said about 20 people — a fraction of the 150 local staff — are heading into the office each day at this point.

Belbahri said internal surveys show three main reasons team members want to be there: to socialize, to get out of the house and to collaborate with colleagues.

"So, work is not about work — work is about people," she said.

But their office is different than it used to be, as staff don't have their own machines to use at work anymore because those devices are at their homes.

Instead, they have to book the use of a floating workstation for a particular day.

Another change? All the drawers that used to sit under the desks are gone.

"We actually sold them off," Belbahri said, noting they've been replaced with lockers because "nobody was going to store things at their desk anymore."

An app for that

At the nearby local offices of SAP Canada — a multinational software company that employs more than 3,000 people across its Canadian workforce —  staff are also using technology to plan out their use of office space.

Specifically, employees at this newly opened Montreal facility — where SAP Canada is piloting future-of-work ideas — have an app for that.

"You can, through this app, schedule your day and book the areas [where] you intend to work," said Megan Smith, the head of HR at SAP Canada.

That's key in an office that lacks assigned seating.

The app also lets employees see who else will be in the office on a given day, so they can determine who they plan to interact with.  

Accelerated trends

Smith said the tech sector had been highly focused on hybrid work for some time, but these arrangements have become "way more pervasively accepted" during the pandemic.

"We definitely had certain functions that were considered office functions, and now pretty much everything's on the table as a job that could be done remotely," she said.

Sheila Botting, a Toronto-based executive with commercial real estate firm Avison Young Canada, agrees that changes happening pre-pandemic have picked up momentum amid a broader adoption of flexible work.

"Now we all understand that we can work anywhere, any time, any place with anyone in any way that we want," Botting said.

That has real estate implications — as organizations may decide they need less space now than before the pandemic.

Botting said commercial real estate tenants typically lease space in five- or 10-year increments. But those with leases expiring in the next few years are thinking about their changing needs.

"They're saying to themselves: 'Well, what is the art of the possible? What could our future workplace look like?'" 

Looking ahead

ATB Financial, a provincial Crown corporation that employs more than 5,000 people in Alberta, has been thinking a lot about how its workspaces work for its staff.

"How we work together is a critical enabler of our culture," Tara Lockyer, ATB's chief people officer, said in a statement.

"In recent years, we've started to rethink how we allocate and occupy space to ensure we're using our workspaces as efficiently as possible and enabling the work we're actually doing."

ATB has corporate staff it hopes to see spending more time in its workplaces next year.

Team leaders will determine "the optimal mix" of future in-person work, Lockyer said.

Touchless features, better air filtration

Telecommunications giant Telus is aiming to reopen its offices early next year — but the company expects 90 per cent of its staff will still be working remotely.

"We believe the workplace of the future will be increasingly virtual," Jennifer Anquetil, the company's director of people and culture, said in an emailed statement.

Anquetil said leaders at Telus are being encouraged to move toward a world where the office is a place to collaborate and meet with team members, on whatever schedule "makes sense for the individual and their team."

The company, which employs 29,000 people nationwide, is in the midst of "transforming its office spaces," Anquetil said.

Some of the heath-and-safety-minded changes include the integration of more touchless doors and enhanced air filtration "where possible," she said.

Headed for hybrid

ATB Financial, Microsoft Canada, SAP Canada, Telus and some of Canada's big banks are among the large employers signalling they'll embrace a more flexible future.

The federal government, the country's largest employer, is thinking about doing the same.

Most public servants remain working at home, the Treasury Board Secretariat of Canada said via email — though updated guidelines permit more of them to "work together in larger numbers" again.

However, the board pointed to recent remarks by Treasury Board President Mona Fortier about the direction the public service is headed.

And it said the government will continue "to build flexibility into our work models, including hybrid work, where this is possible and where it makes sense."

If the way we work is going to change, offices are going to change, too | CBC News