We’ve been working from home for so long I think we’ve all created some daily dependencies. I know our pets have started to depend on our daily presence.
And now, returning to work in the office means breaking those dependencies.
When we first shifted out of the office to work from home, there was an element of reluctance – many workers were dependent on their work from office routines. Not just hardware setups, but the pathways in our brains grooved to the commute, the arrival, the work, the connections, the return commute.
At our workplace, we had many Team Members who were reluctant to move to work-from-home mode and continued to work from the office as all around them transitioned out.
Two years later, we now return to the office. The same people are resisting.
It is a change thing. Everyone needs to be supported during this change, and some need more support than others.
Over time the critical mass of Team Members returning to the office – the early adopters, reluctant participants, and timid acceptors of company expectations – will oblige the resisting Team Members to accept the inevitable. And return to the work-from-office mode, albeit hybridly.