While the push to bring workers back into the office post-pandemic began years ago, new research suggests that the return-to-office trend is hitting an inflection point—and hybrid work standards are evolving.

According to the Placer.ai Nationwide Office Building Index, which analyzes foot traffic across 1,000 commercial office buildings, visits to work sites studied in July were up nearly 11% compared to one year previously. It marked the busiest in-office month since before the pandemic, with traffic now at nearly 80% of pre-COVID levels.

The return-to-office push is evident among the nation’s leading employers: New research from Flex Index found that while nearly three-quarters of the Fortune 100 offer some flexibility to their workforces, nearly 30% have brought workers full-time back into the office. Employers are also asking hybrid workers to work on-site more frequently: Forty-five percent of the Fortune 100, Flex Index reports, require four or five days in-person, while about a third offer a three-day schedule.

Yet, the report cautions, the numbers don’t necessarily reflect “flexibility’s death.” Among the 9,000 U.S. firms Flex Index studied, there was an increase of 2 percentage points in the share of organizations requiring full-time work since last year—but changing state and federal government requirements account for half of that, researchers say.

Smaller firms, in particular, the research found, are more likely to continue to lean into hybrid and remote work. And they may see a payoff: Flex Index found that fully flexible organizations grew revenue at a rate of 1.7 times that of companies with return-to-office mandates.

According to two HR leaders at remote-first companies that HR Executive recently spoke to, capturing that ROI takes the right culture, leadership support and an HR function willing to be bold, agile and creative.

Workleap’s lessons from a hybrid work transformation

Pre-pandemic, talent management platform provider Workleap—which employs about 400—had an entirely in-office culture.

“We had a full-time barista and everything; everything happened at the office,” says Kahina Ouerdane, chief people officer. The company even won architecture and design awards for its Montreal headquarters—for which it signed a 10-year lease shortly before the pandemic. At that time, nearly all talent came from the Montreal area.

After shifting to remote at the start of COVID, leaders and the board of directors began discussions in 2020 about their long-range plans—and made the decision for a “big, big shift” to stay remote-first. In part, the transformation was meant to help Workleap “live firsthand” what its customers and clients were experiencing, Ouerdane says.

“We all decided to take the leap,” she says.

The company now recruits from across Canada and the U.S., and permits employees to live abroad, with few exceptions, for up to five months a year.

The pivot has worked, in part, she says, because of Workleap’s culture—already focused on employee empowerment, such as through its unlimited PTO policy.

An evolution from ‘super rigid’ to ‘less adamant’

“One of the things that’s always been true about this company is that this notion of freedom is in our DNA,” she says. “That was in our culture to begin with—but this was still a big transformation.”

It wasn’t without its bumps, she adds. At first, the company was “super rigid” about what remote-first would look like—ensuring that if workers were in the office, they were in separate rooms for team meetings, for instance, to give remote workers an equal experience.

“At first, we thought, ‘You can’t force anybody into the office ever—it’s about freedom, freedom.’ And that created issues,” she acknowledges. “We’ve become less adamant. There are certain circumstances where it can make a world of difference to have people in a room together.”

Approaching in-person work with intentionality

Now, Workleap asks all employees to come into its headquarters twice a year—in April, at the start of its fiscal year, and again near the end of the calendar year. Over about three days, employees and leaders can talk strategy, participate in workshops, connect directly with their own teams, listen to guest speakers and take part in social activities.

“We fly everyone in, and it’s like a big reunion,” Ouerdane says.

Managers and leaders may come together slightly more often—especially to tackle specific problems.

“When there’s something very strategic or with a high level of complexity, or a problem no one has managed to fix that is growing over time—it may be good to say, ‘OK, let’s get into a room for two days and figure this out.’ ”

Scheduled company gatherings are also becoming the norm for ezCater, a remote-first food tech platform for U.S. workplaces. Once a month, the company hosts an “ezTogether Week,” inviting all of its approximately 850 employees to its Boston location. Participation is optional, and about 150-200 people typically attend.

“It allows for this in-person connection, relationship-building, these opportunities for collaboration and serendipitous conversation,” says Robert Kaskel, vice president of people. “There’s a lot of entertainment and restaurants, so it serves as a fun factor as well.”

Culture and communication

The voluntary nature of the event mirrors the flexibility ezCater has delivered through its hybrid model; employees can work from anywhere in the country, on a 100% at-home basis, or from the Boston office, as much or as little as they want.

Kaskel lives in Seattle and typically travels to Boston at least every other month.

Apart from building connections at ezTogether Weeks with team members and managers, employees also have easy access to company leaders.

“ezCater has a pretty impressive egalitarian culture,” Kaskel says. The CEO or other C-suite members often are in the common areas, eating lunch with employees during the gatherings.

“An employee can go and sit down at the table, have a conversation about life, have a conversation about the business,” he says. “It’s an opportunity to build connection, and it’s encouraged by our leaders. It’s a pretty special part of our culture.”

See also: Amid the RTO debate, is there value in providing food at work?

Why HR has to ‘get out of our comfort zone’

Culture is key to making hybrid work a reality, Ouerdane says.

While Workleap’s culture prizes autonomy, which has helped its model find success, at organizations where employees feel trust is already “shaky,” hybrid work will become all the more challenging, she advises. Red flags often exist, such as employees feeling stifled from taking ownership of projects.

“When there’s a micromanagement approach, that’s where HR can get stuck in the middle” between employees eager for autonomy and leadership unwilling to loosen their hold, she notes.

In such environments, leadership may “fall back” on return-to-office as a “solution,” especially if engagement or productivity issues crop up in hybrid work settings.

Ouerdane notes, for instance, that she finds onboarding leaders can be a challenge in a remote environment. She likens the process to inviting someone on a trip to Italy: You want them to taste the wine and the pasta, to walk the streets of Florence or Rome—not just to look at pictures and witness someone else’s narrative.

Thinking outside the RTO box

That’s why the team is bringing leaders together for a third in-person gathering in September and may consider more in-person opportunities.

“[In HR], I’m the tourist guide, but they’re not there with me,” she says. “So, when they can come together, they get to live in Italy a little bit more.”

When some organizations face a significant talent challenge like onboarding leaders virtually, they pivot back to full, in-person work. Yet, Ouerdane urges HR leaders to be the voice that helps organizations first identify the real problems they’re looking to solve by returning to the office—and perhaps “grow the muscles” needed to consider bold, alternative strategies.

“There may be an array of solutions, but I think [working in an office] is just something we used to do for ages, so it’s easy to go back to that,” she says. “We need to get out of our comfort zone as leaders, or we’re going to just fall into those old habits.”

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