Across practitioner reports and peer-reviewed research, including a new report from the Institute for Corporate Productivity, organizations that commit to highly flexible models, including remote-first, report strong output, healthier engagement, and faster growth than mandate-driven peers.
Several offices have lifted the work-from-home mandate after the pandemic ended, claiming that workers are more productive in offices. A user who goes by u/furrows_diocese-8q shared a post on January 18 about how their sister dealt with the situation when her boss made the same claim. The crew was doing their job well and were content with their prior remote arrangement, but were forced to come to the office.
It was a phenomenon that Nilles, a U.S. Air Force veteran turned NASA consultant, dubbed the "telecommunications-transportation tradeoff." Viewing remote work as a potential substitute for commuting, Nilles sought to gauge telework's effectiveness by partnering with a major national insurance company (whose name he still can't divulge for legal reasons). A group of employees worked from local centers equipped with "minicomputers" that transferred data to the company's mainframe. In the 1974 pilot study, Nilles concluded that this approach resulted in higher productivity and reduced turnover.