The value of clarity: Clear expectations are the secret to making hybrid work a success
清晰的价值:明确的要求是混合办公成功的秘诀
White-collar workers tend to like hybrid working. Research by Nicholas Bloom of Stanford University suggests that, on average, employees reckon the blend of in-person and remote work is a perk equivalent to an 8% pay increase.
白领往往是喜欢混合办公的。斯坦福大学的尼古拉斯·布鲁姆的研究表明,平均而言,员工认为坐班办公和远程办公的结合是一种相当于加薪8%的福利。
The biggest attraction of days spent working from home is the absence of a commute. Other benefits include not having to get ready for the office: the proportion of people wearing a fresh set of clothes drops by 20 percentage points when they are not commuting.
居家办公的最大吸引力在于无需通勤。其他好处还包括不必为上班穿戴打扮:在不通勤的时候,(每天)穿新的换洗衣服的人占比下降了20个百分点。
Executives have been keener to get people back into the office full-time, so that employees can bond with peers, absorb the corporate culture and appreciate the awesome power of laundry.
管理者更热衷于让员工全职回归办公室,这样员工就可以与同事建立联系,吸收企业文化,并充分体会洗衣店的绝妙之处。
But even sceptics have accepted that hybrid working will be part of the post-pandemic future: in his annual letter to shareholders this week, Jamie Dimon, the boss of JPMorgan Chase, said he thought that about 40% of the bank's staff would be hybrid.
但即使是持怀疑态度的人也已经接受了混合办公将是后疫情未来的一部分:摩根大通老板杰米·戴蒙在本周致股东的年度信中表示,他认为该行大约40%的员工将会采用混合办公。
The job now is to make sure that hybridisation works as well as it can for both employees and employers. That depends on one ingredient above all: clarity. Things function best when everyone knows what is expected.
目前的工作就是要确保混合办公在雇员和雇主身上都能行得通。这首先取决于一个因素:明确。当每个人都知道该做什么时,一切就能实现最佳运转。
Start with the shape of the hybrid week. One of the great theoretical attractions of hybrid working to employees is that they get to choose what days they come in.
首先说一下混合周这一形态。理论上讲,混合办公对员工的一个巨大吸引力在于,他们可以选择在哪些日子到公司上班。
But the point of in-person working is to spend time collaborating and bonding with their colleagues: that is much more likely to happen if companies are clear about who they want in the office on which days of the week.
而坐班办公的意义在于花时间与同事们进行合作以及建立关系:如果公司清楚地知道他们想让哪些人在一周的哪几天来办公室办公,这些情况就更有可能发生。
Clarity also maximises the benefits of work-from-home days. If office time is best spent in a whirlwind of collaborative brainstorming and socialising, home days are logically the time when solo and focused work should get done.
明确还能最大限度地发挥居家办公的优势。如果说待在办公室的时间最好是花在一连串的协作性头脑风暴和社交上,那么从逻辑上讲,在家的日子就是独自一人专注完成工作的时间。
That requires bosses to do what comes unnaturally to them, by resisting the temptation to interrupt at will.
这就要求老板们做一些对他们来说有违常理的事,忍住随意打扰员工的冲动。