The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered a huge shift in working practices – particularly for office-based workers, who have largely had to work from home throughout the past year.
However, it may be that the pandemic has accelerated an existing trend, not created a new one.
Over recent years there has been an increased desire for flexibility. In the age of the laptop and (for most people) cheap broadband connections that offer decent speeds, the traditional model which advocated the need to be in the office on weekdays from 9am until 5pm was already being questioned.
Therefore, the order to ‘work from home if you can’ was the official endorsement that many people had been dreaming of for the last 10 years.
In effect, the pandemic forced us into a nationwide home working experiment.
As a result, working from home has become second nature to most of us. So does this signal the end of the office?
Well, despite the near-apocalyptic claims at the outset of the pandemic, this is unlikely to be the end of office work, but rather another phase in the evolution of the office.
For example, according to a 2020 survey by Savills, up to 89% of respondents believe that physical office space remains a necessity for companies to operate successfully. And while some employers are considering alternatives, many are still willing to spend large amounts of money on office space.
Clearly then, the office is a lot more than just a place to do work. After all, the home office allows you to do that.