During the past year, we have learned that flexible work does work, as millions of people have moved their tools and modes of employment from the office to the home. A generation of change was delivered in a matter of months, and there’s no going back.
But this transition is far from over. In 2022, we won’t keep “lifting and shifting” old ways of working from the office to the home. Instead, we will develop digital HQs, which will improve productivity, foster innovation and help increase the diversity of company workforces. Indeed many companies will only have digital headquarters.
These headquarters will require different ways of working. A strong digital head office doesn’t mean we’ll never see our colleagues again, rather we’ll bring teams physically together only when it make sense to do so.
We will see new roles to manage this collaborative infrastructure and innovative approaches to strengthening organisational culture. Executive leaders will spend time with project teams to build camaraderie, but limit their own time in the office to ensure that power and opportunities for promotion don’t centralise and that people no longer mistake presenteeism for performance. Most physical spaces will be flexible and shared for teamwork. It used to be that our digital infrastructure supported in-person ways of collaborating. In 2022 it will be the other way around.
Finally, recruitment will increasingly concern itself with offering the flexibility people want. According to our research, conducted across more than 10,000 people in the US, the UK, France, Germany, Japan and Australia, 93 per cent of knowledge workers want a flexible schedule and 76 per cent want flexibility as to where they work. Digital headquarters will also improve the employee mix of many companies. Companies that used to be based in cities such as London, San Francisco, Tokyo or Munich will tap into broader talent pools in more places and swell the ranks of under-represented minorities. Wealth will be distributed more equitably across locations and among populations.
New digital tools and platforms will eliminate the unproductive stream of back-to-back meetings that most knowledge workers suffer from. The 9-5 work day has never worked for many, and its boundaries have long been abused. In its place will be more asynchronous and distributed tasks that provide flexibility for juggling work and the rest of life, and clearer ways for teams and people to avoid 24/7 burnout. Strong digital headquarters will recreate the fast, ambient and informal discussions people miss from the office while connecting employees, customers and partners who are working flexibly across different projects and time zones. And they will lead to a greater transparency of information, keeping teams aligned and connected and increasing productivity and morale.
In 2022, we will see that we don’t simply have to shift days full of meetings into people’s homes, but that we will be able to disrupt existing work patterns and transform our digital space to be the place where work happens. As a result, it will be more flexible, inclusive, connected and productive. Businesses that thrive in the next decade will be those that have embraced this bold reinvention.
Get more expert predictions for the year ahead. The WIRED World in 2022 features intelligence and need-to-know insights sourced from the smartest minds in the WIRED network. Available now on newsstands, as a digital download, or you can order your copy online.
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This article was originally published by WIRED UK
