Hybrid Working: The Impact of COVID-19 on People’s Worklife and Productivity, and the Impact on Cooperative Innovation and Collaboration

Many parts of the world have seen hybrid working since the swine flu. In the period from April and May of 2023 to May of 2021, more than 42,000 workers in 34 countries were questioned about where they work. The results show that, although 67% of people work fully on-site, more than 25% now have hybrid working arrangements, with another 8% working fully from home. The English-speaking world has higher home-working rates for graduates. The most common patterns of hybrid work are three days a week in office and two days at home.

It is important for employers to hear what research shows about creating happier and more productive workplace. Losing workers is expensive: Trip.com estimates that recruitment and training costs amount to US$20,000 for each new worker. Whereas the company previously required employees to work on-site all week unless they were travelling for business purposes, Han says that, following the trial, it has expanded its hybrid working policy to all employees.

It’s more than just about employers and employees. There is a wider, under-researched social context that must be considered, too — for example, the sustainability implications of maintaining office buildings that are less populated versus fewer commutes, and the impact on the wider economy and the livelihoods of other, often lower-paid people in the service sector if fewer people are travelling to city centres for work.

For many, the COVID-19 pandemic was a large, uncontrolled experiment in adapting to different working practices. It is possible to put some science behind it.

As a result, which mode of work — remote, in-person or a hybrid of the two — produces the best results has become a hot research topic. Previous work has shown that fully remote working has negative effects such as harming cross-company collaboration1 and reducing the generation of breakthrough ideas2. The latest study3, published this week in Nature, builds on existing evidence to indicate that there is, at least, less for employers to fear as far as hybrid working is concerned. As ever, with such a complex topic, however, more research is needed.

Now, many employers want to roll back the home-working revolution amid fears that remote working harms productivity, creativity and collaboration. In some cases, they are mandating that employees return to fully in-person working, often to strident protests from their employees.

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Scientists have discovered that painted lady butterflies and rock engravings on the Orinoco river are connected.

A comprehensive suite of biomedical data, collected during the first all-civilian spaceflight, is helping researchers unpick the effects that being in orbit has on the human body. Short duration spaceflights can result in changes similar to those seen on longer spaceflights according to data collected from the crew of the Inspiration4 mission. Most of the changes reverted soon after the crew descended, but things like immune-cell function alterations and a shortening of DNA telomeres were included.