The Trump administration really wants Americans to have more kids. President Trump, the self-proclaimed " fertilization president," has called for a new " baby boom." Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy says communities with big families should get more government funds. The on-again-off-again Trump ally Elon Musk, father of at least 14, has warned that "civilization will disappear" if we don't get busy.
A more-or-less universal pivot to hybrid working has further blurred the lines between what to wear to work and what you actually want to wear to work. Never before has comfort been such a priority when it comes to corporate dressing. It's why a dress styled with a sweater, jumper or cardigan has become the ultimate sartorial solution to carry your work wardrobe from this wet spell through to spring.
While some workers are being mandated to return to the office, a growing majority of workers now say they want to "microshift" their workday. Unlike hybrid or remote schedules, in which you work remotely some or all of the time, microshifting is about making small adjustments to your start times, breaks and hours rather than adhering to a rigid nine-to-five schedule.
The global average building utilization rate dramatically jumped in 2025 to 53%, the highest since before the pandemic, validating the effectiveness of hybrid strategies in driving more in-office activity, according to CBRE. Utilization rates were 38% in 2024 and 35% in 2023, compared to the 65% that most respondents to CBRE's global workplace occupancy benchmarking program identified as their target.
Micah Remley, chief executive officer at Robin, a contract-review company that utilizes AI, frames the moment clearly. AI-based workplace platforms can absorb the logistical coordination that office attendance requires, he says, freeing the office to deliver what home setups rarely match: faster alignment and richer collaboration. Leaders who treat AI as an experience upgrade, paired with intentional in-person time, create a workplace people choose.
Rebecca Hinds has studied office meetings and collaboration efforts for more than 15 years and most recently she's seen how AI can make corporate get-togethers better - or worsen existing problems. In a study commissioned by Read.AI, Hinds found that AI, when correctly implemented, can encourage more participation by women and lower-level employees. At the same time, it can actually hurt hybrid meetings, with in-room participants speaking up much more than remote attendees. AI could make meetings much worse.
Resume Builder reported last October that 30% of companies will eliminate remote work in 2026. According to a survey of business leaders by Vena Solutions , a private financial software company, 83% of CEOs globally anticipate a return to full-time office work in 2027. But what if there's a better way to frame this conversation? What if the focus shifts away from where employees are working to when employees are working?
One of the rationale provided by the government [to] cancel the program was that they were hoping to revitalize the downtown core in various locations across the province and having members return to work would be the magic sauce,
Loneliness and burnout-deeply interwined in the workplace-are hitting American workers (and companies) hard. In 2025, global healthcare firm Cigna found that over half of all employees surveyed felt lonely. Around 57% admitted to feeling unmotivated and stagnant, while two-thirds of full-time workers say they experience burnout on the job, according to a 2025 Gallup study. The financial toll is jaw-dropping. Harvard Business Review reports that loneliness costs U.S. companies up to $154 billion annually through lost productivity, increased burnout, and employees resigning.
As explains, "if you are late for work, do some work from home, or do anything on Teams and Outlook from any network that is not your organization's, your employer would know about this. This obviously did not sit well with workers who either work in hybrid setups or do not appreciate this type of invasion of privacy."
His answer cut through the noise. "Look," he said, "in the end, there's only one thing that matters, which is trust. We're all in the trust business. That is the business. And the leaders who succeed are the ones who have a reservoir of trust." That idea has stayed with me because it's old wisdom that is increasingly forgotten. We are living through an era obsessed with speed, scale, and technology.
Tech companies are still signing leases in downtown Seattle - but it's not enough to reverse a pandemic-era slide that pushed office vacancy to another record high, reaching 34.7% in Q4. The latest numbers from commercial real estate firm CBRE underscore how hybrid work and shrinking office footprints continue to weigh on a tech-heavy market like Seattle. The vacancy rate is up about two percentage points from a year ago, and a fivefold increase from before the pandemic.
Many organisations are entering the year facing economic headwinds, while the early promises of AI have yet to be fully realised and hybrid working has still not fully settled. Leaders will be asking what it will take to unlock higher productivity in a period of uncertainty. At the same time, the labour market will feel unusually static. With a frozen jobs market for recent graduates, fewer people will want to take risks by moving roles.
Hybrid work has rewritten the brief for the office. The focus has shifted from real estate leases and floor plans toward lifestyle-oriented service as a measure of value. In this new reality, developers, investors, and hospitality brands are converging around the shared goal of creating workspaces that feel flexible and connected. The result is an office space that behaves like a great hotel, with services and amenities that invite people in and support specific lifestyle choices.
