The Daily Update: Working from home

As life starts to get back to some sort of normality, many companies and their employee’s thoughts are turning to a return to the office. However, according to a Deloitte survey 7.5 million employees never want to go back to the office, nearly one in four. At the same time around 28% are desperate to get back whilst around 40% want a balance in-between, three days in the office, two at home. The mid 30’s seems to be a clear dividing line when it comes to returning to the office. Many under 35’s seem to have found working from home more challenging. As Will Gosling of Deloitte noted ‘Those coming into the workforce, in their early careers, are sponges. They can learn technical stuff anywhere, but what gives them the edge and what makes work interesting and exciting is the stuff you cannot learn in a textbook or an online course’.

However, for the older generation of workers, especially those over 50, the old ideas of getting into the office came rain or shine, have changed. Many, who have been trudging into the office for over 30 years, now believe that there is a better way. Before the pandemic most had the ability to work from home, however, it was always easier to get into work. Once they were told they had to work from home 100% they slowly embraced the idea and now feel it is the way forward for at least part of the working week.

Working from home 100% of the time though is not a good idea for anyone, especially in the investment industry. No matter how many Zoom or Microsoft Teams calls you make you can never replicate being in an office. Being at home full time blinkers you. You need your views challenged, to make your point as well as listen to other people’s views. Those conversations that we all have in the office over anything from how the US dollar has performed this year, to UK house prices mean something. We might disagree with 99% of what a colleague says, however it only takes one sentence to spark a different way of thinking about something.