RTO trends: Are we really all heading back to offices full-time?

By Dawn Kawamoto
Video
June 23, 2024 at 07:00 PM
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Citigroup, HSBC and Barclays are the latest banking titans mandating that more employees come into the office five days a week, raising the question of whether a full-time, return-to-office policy is trending.

However, before jumping to this conclusion, Rob Sadow, co-founder and CEO of hybrid work productivity tool company Scoop Technologies, suggests reviewing his company's latest Flex Index research, which shows that full-time, return-to-office mandates have declined across industries by 10 to nearly 30 percentage points over the past year.

5 day a week in office

Five-day return-to-office policies—and even three-day in-office requirements—have pitted employees against employers, leaving HR leaders to contend with worker uprisings, higher attrition rates and more significant difficulties in recruiting.

See also: Many RTO policies are failing, research shows. Here's how to fix them

However, Sadow notes that the Flex Index numbers alone do not fully represent the full-time-in-office trend.

Sadow, who recently sat down with Human Resource Executive for a video interview, weighs in on the recent moves by Citi, HSBC and Barclays, plus where full-time in-office policies are heading and why.

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