The post-pandemic world of work - summary of the episode

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, companies have had to deal with a number of changes in a short period of time: all of a sudden, many people worked from home, virtual collaboration intensified, and the pace of digitalization had to be accelerated. But what does this mean for the world of work after the pandemic?
Christina and Christian – Senior Managers at zeb.move – agree that the hybrid way of working will continue even after the pandemic and that employees will spend about half of the time working from home. Remote work will continue to play a major role, especially in administrative business without customer contact. This is having an impact on office space: rooms are increasingly being made available for groups and desk sharing is getting more common. The office is turning into a place where people meet and work on joint projects, while administrative tasks can be carried out at home. 

At the same time, however, remote work requires a new management style. How can the productivity and motivation of employees be maintained at a distance? While the overall productivity of all employees working from home can largely be equated with productivity in the office, the performance of individual employees varies greatly. In the future, therefore, it will be important for managers to create transparency about the responsibilities and work progress of individual employees. Digital Kanban boards with clearly assigned responsibilities and daily meetings to discuss work progress are suitable for this purpose. To motivate employees, target agreements and reward systems must be transparent and flexible. This is where the OKR method comes in: by setting goals for the company’s individual departments and breaking them down further on a quarterly basis at the level of individual teams and employees, staff members are more likely to identify with them. As a result, the added value of the work that has been completed is evident to the entire team.

Aside from changing the way people work, the option of working remotely also impacts the recruiting effort – as the geographic area, in which employees can be recruited, is expanded. In addition, other competencies play a role in selecting new employees, such as their willingness to take on personal responsibility. Generally, companies’ flexibility increases, resulting in benefits for the consumer through faster innovation. This is a win-win situation that will become normal over time.