As Forbes recently discussed, studies suggest that hybrid and remote models are widely supported in the business world as follows:

• Studies show that 80% of financial services firms now have hybrid work models in place, with some allowing full flexibility and others requiring 2-3 days per week in the office.
• A survey of women workers found that 88% believe hybrid work equalizes the workplace and reduces biases, and 72% would look for a new job if hybrid flexibility was taken away.
• 67% of women said hybrid work positively impacts their career growth by allowing more efficiency, opportunities for training, and visibility with leadership.

Other than these benefits, hybrid working also can help shift workplace culture away from a “Hustle culture” toward an “Outcome culture”.

What is “Hustle culture”?

“Hustle culture” refers to a workplace culture that glorifies overwork, long hours, and constant busyness or availability.

In a hustle culture, employees feel pressure to show how hard they’re working through efforts like frequently responding to emails late at night or coming into the office on weekends.

This culture implies that more hours logged or less time off equals greater dedication or higher performance.

Proponents of an “outcome culture” argue this focus on hours is misguided. Rather than tracking how much employees work, the emphasis should be on achieving key results and impacts.

Managers should clearly define desired outcomes, and as long as those outcomes are delivered, the specific hours worked or time off taken is less relevant. This could reduce burnout, improve work-life balance, and boost productivity.

However, a pure outcome culture may not suit every role or company. It also requires a shift in how managers evaluate and reward employees to be successful.

While deprioritizing hours in favor of results may sound good in theory, it must be balanced with ensuring employees are meeting reasonable productivity or workload expectations.

How hybrid working helps?

Hybrid work models that incorporate remote work make it harder to track how many hours employees spend working or to monitor face time in the office. This means hours logged or presence are less salient measures of performance, nudging companies to focus more on outcomes achieved.

If managers can’t as easily see who is “hustling” the most or working the longest hours, they must rely more on clear outcome expectations and trust that employees will get the work done on their own schedules.

At the same time, hybrid work gives employees more control and flexibility in how and when they work. This autonomy is better suited to an outcome culture, where employees are responsible for meeting goals however they choose, rather than an hours-based hustle culture.

When people have flexibility, they can work when they’re most productive and balanced, which could boost results. And when they are evaluated based on outcomes, not hours, their work time may be less demanding, reducing burnout.

Of course, hybrid or remote work is not a silver bullet and does not guarantee an outcome culture will emerge. Companies must make deliberate choices to define outcomes, evaluate performance accordingly, and grant flexibility/autonomy.

Managers will need support in adjusting to this type of culture as well. However, hybrid models do create an opportunity to at least reduce fixation on hours and encourage a shift in focus toward the results and impacts of work.

For companies seeking a healthier and potentially more productive culture, this could be a valuable benefit of hybrid work. Implementing a smart office system like ONES can also help enable seamless hybrid collaboration, facilitating the transition to an outcome-oriented evaluation and promotion of work-life balance.

To learn more, schedule a demo today.

The post How Hybrid Work Could Inspire an Outcome-Driven Culture? first appeared on ONEs Blog.

According to multiple polls, millennials and Generation Zs prioritize flexible working over other advantages, maybe even overcompensation.

Flexibility: pillar of the Good Work Framework

Based on the World Economic Forum’s recent report “The Good Work Framework: A new business agenda for the future of work“, ‘Provide flexibility and protection is one of the five pillars of the Good Work Framework and the key component for a new future of work.

Flexibility is frequently used to signify not working in an office. As hybrid working evolves, we’re still having those ‘How many days are you in?’ talks.

However, post-pandemic, flexible working expectations are considerably broader than previously. Companies should begin by defining a clear flexibility strategy as part of their business plan, supported by clear policies and processes (e.g. eligibility) – generating a vision and direction for the whole organization.

Communication, change management, and the appropriate resources and structure (remote workplace setup, technology and security, and job redesign) are also important.

Why flexibility matters?

Based on Gartner’s recent report about productivity, 43% of respondents cited factors of time efficiency and flexibility as their main reason for increased productivity.

Fixed or formal flexible work arrangements (e.g., working part-time) remain vital for people who demand more assurance about when they must or must not be available to work.

Most, if not all, official flexible working agreements include some type of part-time work. There are various reasons why people want or require a decreased workload and time commitment to the company, but many are related to their caring obligations.

For example, Singaporeans seek more flexibility because they need to spend time with family is more important than work. According to a survey about family bonds by the Families for Life Council of Singapore, one in two respondents said that could not accept that long working hours prevented them from spending more time with their families.

If Singapore companies adopt flexible working, there are many benefits for both company and people:  

1. Flexible working makes employees more engaged in their work so as to have high productivity; 
2. A flexible working policy allows for waiver of paying the extra operating expenses, and;  
3. Flexible working hours allow employees to spend more time with their families, preventing them from quitting. 

Prepare your hybrid office for 2023

There are practically no restrictions on how the trends in offices may help you now and in the future as long as smart technology solutions continue to advance.

Smart office systems have the potential to enhance every aspect of the workplace, including productivity, health and safety, host desking, and employee well-being.

Employing a skilled installer who can create and deploy a unique smart office system tailored to your company’s needs is essential if you want to take full advantage of what smart technology has to offer.

Contact us: hello@ones.software, or visit ONES Software official website for more information: https://ones.software/. 

The post Flexibility in office unlocks engagement and productivity, by World Economic Forum first appeared on ONEs Blog.

LinkedIn suggests the first step is to improve boring meeting rooms. So, LinkedIn’s new flagship building in Mountain View, Calif. meeting rooms feature comfortable furniture and cutting-edge technology, and it was created by the architectural firm NBBJ, to make their office more flexible. 

What you should know

• The first requirement to improve the meeting room atmosphere is to meet the needs of your staff;
• Flexibility is very important for newly designed meeting rooms;

New design for LinkedIn’s meeting rooms  

LinkedIn believes that bringing flexibility into the meeting space will make people’s work more enjoyable. If they are happier at work, the boring atmosphere would naturally go away. Therefore, compared with traditional meeting rooms, the newly designed meeting rooms with a greater focus on employees’ needs and well-being. 

The new conference rooms feature movable partitions to expand or reduce meeting space at any time and provide additional sterilization equipment to protect the health of employees.  

LinkedIn added open conference spaces amid the desks of engineers on the same teams. If they want to have a discussion with others, workers can pop into one of these spaces and close the sliding doors — or leave them open. Also, providing some soundproof equipment in these areas ensures workers can focus on work.  

Some conference room management systems can provide a very flexible free room combination function. Colleagues can change the size and equipment of the conference room according to the needs of the meeting, so as to add more vitality to the work.

“The intention is for it (newly designed meeting room) to be hyperflexible…Acoustical baffling on the ceiling dampens sound, and its zigzag shape adds more dynamism to the room, enlivening what is normally a flat, static plane,” said Robert Norwood, a principal at NBBJ. 

Relax atmosphere encourages employees to speak more 

LinkedIn uses a modernist oak table from Anthropologie to replace a central table in conference spaces that look more like lounges.  Also, each has a squishy sofa with throw pillows, and plants and books abound.  

“The relaxed look is intended to help meeting participants feel comfortable and encourage members of the staff “who might not speak up in a traditional setting,” Lisa Britz, LinkedIn’s director of workplace design said. 

Virtual meeting tools add interest to meetings 

Adding virtual tools to the meeting room can connect remote workers to work together with office-fully workers and provide more energy in meetings. There have some large horizontal screens in meeting rooms on LinkedIn, allowing for sharing documents on one side and showing the faces of remote colleagues on the other.  

Additionally, some companies’ conference rooms are also equipped with a digital whiteboard and a special camera mounted on an opposite wall that “ghosts out” the person writing so colleagues working at home can see what’s being written in real-time. It makes the meetings or presentations look funnier. 

The real estate services firm, CBRE has conducted a survey of companies occupying office space recently. It found that 76 percent of respondents considered enhanced videoconferencing one of the top priorities in their return to the office. 

Need an office management system to control flexible equipment 

As mentioned above, providing flexible working equipment in the meeting room can improve the condition of work in the meeting. However, you need to be aware that to manage these devices you need a well-developed office management system.  

A well-developed office management system allows you to reserve the required meeting room and ensure that your meeting is not disturbed while it is in progress. 

ONES is one of the famous all-in-one smart office systems that can help you to easily implement hybrid working at ease in Indonesia.  You can easily perform virtual meetings, desk hoteling, and digital office management with our Room Booking, Desk Booking, and Visitor Management features.  

Contact us: hello@ones.software, or visit ONES Software official website for more information: https://ones.software/.  
 

The post Say goodbye to your boring meeting room! How LinkedIn implement new office layout first appeared on ONEs Blog.

A national survey of Australia interviewed 1,421 Australian knowledge workers in March 2022. The aim of the survey is to study the difference in working arrangements among hybrid, remote, and office work in Australia. 

In this survey, it shows that flexibility makes employees happier due to hybrid working.

Flexibility leads, survey shows

The survey sample was nationally representative of state and age populations, including 58% of males and 42% of females.   

The survey asked participants a total of 46 questions, covering their current work arrangements, ideal work arrangements, health and well-being, workplace culture, skills changes and communication technologies…etc.

The survey shows that: 

• 54% of workers are following a hybrid work model; 
• 23% of workers still working remotely full-time, and; 
• 22.9% of workers return to the office full-time. 

Compared to the beginning of the epidemic, the report shows only 28% of Australian knowledge workers had the chance to work remotely for any part of the week prior to the pandemic.

This indicates significant growth in hybrid work and shows lots of workers would like to work with hybrid work as it is a flexible work style. 

Hybrid work wins as it provides more flexibility

Until today, many places in Australia have adopted flexible working arrangements and the companies have offered different working styles for employees to choose from.

Combine with other reports, the result of the research shows that there are three main types of hybrid work. Moreover, three hybrid work styles individually have lots of supporters: 

1. Fixed days in office: 15% of all respondents said that they need to return to the office on some selected day, such as Monday and Wednesday, and this style is suitable for 29% of hybrid workers. 
2. Fixed office frequency: 13.1% of all respondents said that they have more flexibility than the first style as they can choose which days need to return to the office in a week, and this style is suitable for 24.3% of hybrid workers. 
3. Flexibility to choose: 15.4% of all survey respondents said that they can choose to work where they work and when, and it is suitable for 28.5% of hybrid workers. 

Australians: Hybrid work makes us happier, and work more flexibly 

According to the national survey, part of the survey asked participants to indicate their satisfaction with their current work arrangement on a five-point scale from “very unhappy” to “very happy”. 

Nearly 94% of flexible workers said they were happy or very happy with this arrangement. It is the highest rate compared with 88.5% of workers working remotely full-time, and 70.6% of workers going into the office full-time. 

For the question asking participants ideal work arrangements, they are taking care about of having control over the location where they work and when (23.0%), followed by working remotely full-time (22.8%). 

Hybrid work benefits for well-being and welfare of workers 

30% of workers said they now have a better work-life balance than they did two years ago, compared with less than 8.7% of workers who think it has worsened. 

Over a quarter (27.4%) said flexible working time and location provide them with a better work-life balance, so that they can have more time to enhance their life quality and wellness. 

Increasing workers’ well-being and welfare

Most of the reports are showed that flexibility is important for taking care of employees’ well-being, and the reason is that it has a variety of advantages. Some of the main benefits are like these: 

1. Increasing employees’ productivity: A hybrid office provides a place that gathers new workers and experienced, therefore the new workers can work with instant help from experienced through face-to-face conversation. 
2. Fostering a sense of belonging to a company: A hybrid office has a co-meeting area, which allows the staff for gathering and meeting. With regular meetings, the new workers have more opportunities to understand the company’s culture. 
3. Retain the talents and have a positive impact on developing a company: If the employees feel happy at their work, they will not resign from their jobs. Therefore, lots of manpower has a positive impact on the development of a company. 

What is the requirement to implement hybrid work?  

To implement hybrid work, your hybrid office should work with a comprehensive office management system. It allows you to have flexibility at work, which means you can use any available desk, room, and equipment in the office, and work at the location you wanted.  

ONES is one of the famous all-in-one smart office systems that can help you to easily implement hybrid working at ease. You can easily perform virtual meetings, desk-hoteling, and digital office management with our Room Booking, Desk Booking, and Visitor Management features.      

 
Contact us: hello@ones.software, or visit ONES Software official website for more information: https://ones.software/.     

The post The Australian national study shows that flexibility makes us happier  first appeared on ONEs Blog.

On the other hand, many of the MNCs and government offices in Singapore are now turning to co-working spaces to improve their flexibility.

Klook Singapore: Building family-friendly workplaces with flexibility

The Business Times speaks to three firms to learn how these programs have benefited their workplaces and what advice they would provide to other businesses considering adopting similar programs.

Cary Shek, vice-president of people and culture at Klook, mentioned the company’s position on hybrid work, and the accommodation for staff who are keen to work from home on a regular basis.

At Klook, we are maintaining hybrid work arrangements and we empower our people managers to assess and provide additional flexibility to employees with family or other personal commitments.

The pandemic made us rethink the meaning of the physical workplace and how best we can empower local teams subject to their restrictions. We have to strike a balance, and the hybrid-working model gives us the best of both worlds, in terms of flexibility and human connection.

Cary Shek, vice-president of people and culture at Klook

Over the past two years, Klook has been renting one floor from a coworking space here. Additionally, employees are permitted to utilize desks at all of the co-working chain’s locations, which Klook asked not to be identified.

When Klook first joined the Singapore market a few years ago, according to Ms. Cary Shek, staff were housed in a shophouse. However, as the squad grew, that proved impossible. Klook sought a location that would better encourage employee interaction and collaboration, and discovered that a co-working facility may also provide more flexibility than rented office space.

As a fast-moving company, efficiency is so important to us. Time (is) required to set up a new office and … maintain it. We do need to make a call – where do we want our people to focus on.

A co-working space provides us with the scalability … (and) allows us to optimise the space, like when our business keeps expanding.

Cary Shek, vice-president of people and culture at Klook

Learn more about ONES – an all-in-one smart office system that helps your office changes into a co-working space.

Multinationals use co-working spaces for hybrid working

Apart from Klook, Standard Chartered has already implemented flexible work and believed that flexible work can help them retain its talents. The reason for implementing flexible work is that base on the understanding of Singaporeans’ preferences, spending time with family is more important than work.

The 10,000 workers of Standard Chartered Business in Singapore have access to workplaces that are closer to their homes thanks to flex space supplier IWG, even though the bank still retains its main headquarters in Changi Business Park and Marina Bay Financial Tower 1.

Learn more: How does Standard Chartered introduce flexi-working in Singapore?

The head of resourcing for Standard Chartered in Singapore, Mr. Brian Richards, said he meets up with coworkers at the bank’s main headquarters and occasionally utilizes coworking spaces as a substitute for working from home and for off-site team meetings.

I appreciate the availability of diverse conducive spaces to support my various work needs, and the change in environment is refreshing and boosts productivity.

Mr. Brian Richards, the head of resourcing for Standard Chartered in Singapore

Decentralization, Flexibility, and Cost Reduction

“This is clearly a reflection of the increasing popularity of work-from-anywhere.” Mr. Darren Rogers said, country manager for IWG Singapore.

There is an increasing trend for having workplaces near residences, according to co-working spaces.

Between February and August of this year, more people visited IWG centers outside of the city center than within, according to Mr. Rogers. Since launching in April, visits to its newest Regus center at Balestier’s Hiap Hoe Building increased by 240%.

Flexibility is a key advantage as it allows co-working space users the option to scale up or down, while traditional office leases lock a tenant down for a minimum three years, coupled with the consideration for a longer amortisation period for their fit-outs.

said Mr Desmond Sim, CEO of real estate consulting firm Edmund Tie

Smaller businesses may have easy access to a desirable location through a flexible co-working facility, which is essential for talent acquisition.

When asked to compare the expenses of using a co-working space with renting an office, Mr. Desmond responded that they depend on the location and level of use, but that employing a subscription model has lower upfront expenditures.

In general, a typical cost plan for a co-working space may be quite even and spread out, paid on an annual basis, while a traditional lease will have to incur higher setup costs … at the lease commencement

said Mr Desmond Sim, CEO of real estate consulting firm Edmund Tie

Learn more about Singapore Working Culture: https://ones.software/blog/category/singapore-work-culture/

Reference: https://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/co-working-space-wework-justco-iwg-office-space-2944271

The post S’pore MNCs and Gov offices are now changing into co-working spaces. Here are the reasons. first appeared on ONEs Blog.

Flexibility and autonomy are the key factors for employees in the hybrid working environment. “it’s about how we connect, develop the relationships that serve as the foundation for effective teams, and empower collaboration for both those in the office and those working remotely. “

Recently Zoom hosted a panel on July 13 of their enterprise customers to help them understand how they approach these critical aspects of hybrid work. There are some key messages that are worthy for us to study:

Redesign workspaces to support hybrid work and encourage collaboration

Workspaces are evolved together with working philosophy. The traditional office, which heavily relies on closed offices, traditional meeting rooms, and cubicles, will not meet the needs of today’s hybrid working model.

On Zoom’s panel, lots of thought leaders have mentioned that they have been hard at work modifying their spaces to meet the diverse needs of their teams and implement a hybrid working model.

For example, some leaders mentioned that compared to their old building, which had closed-off offices and high cubicle walls, they have redesigned their office into an open playing field with virtual technology.

“We’ve put a lot of investment into redesigning our spaces to allow teams to collaborate a bit more closely. We also did a lot of planning to help us in that process. We asked our employees to designate one of five workstyles before they came back into the office to help us fine-tune the experience.”

Douglas Edwards, SVP, Enterprise Associate & Business Solutions at Humana

Inclusivity, inclusivity, inclusivity

How can businesses foster an environment in which employees feel included and engaged in both daily collaboration and workplace culture?

 David Picot, SVP of BJ’s Wholesale Club – a retail company with 30,000 people, mentioned that it was incredibly important to reach out and touch base with the employees because most of them are never in the office but in the stores. Therefore they still need to created a series of town hall meetings for people to get in touch.

“We still have them, and people really enjoy the contact, the collaboration, and the opportunity to present different things.”

David Picot, SVP, Real Estate, BJ’s Wholesale Club

Chris Bedi, CDIO at ServiceNow also said that as a big fan of the casual interactions that happen on-site which can help them discover the unknown problems, they need to be dedicated to finding a way to create those casual and spontaneous interactions, whether in-person or remote, in order to increase inclusivity and connection.

Flexibility is at the heart of hybrid work

Just like recently Singapore Government suggests the companies to implement flexible working arrangements (FWA), many leaders agree that with the ability to work from the home, office, or work hybrid, people have greater flexibility in how they work than ever before.

For us, hybrid work is really about flexibility. We value the ability to collaborate in person, but we also highly respect the employees’ right to stay home if they don’t feel comfortable or aren’t able to come in. 

Chris Bedi, CDIO at ServiceNow

Learn more: How do S’pore enterprises implement the best workplaces?

Based on our experience, to provide high flexibility and inclusivity, a hybrid office should use a comprehensive office management system, which helps employees use office resources efficiently, such as rooms, desks, and office equipment, and support them to have remote work and virtual meetings with their colleagues in the office.   

Bookings ONE, one of the famous management systems, can help you to easily implement hybrid working at ease.  You can easily perform virtual meetings, desk-hoteling, and digital office management with our Room Booking, Desk Booking, and Visitor Management features.  

ONEs Software now has a dedicated page to introduce a series of hybrid working measures to help you solve problems. You may wish to go to https://ones.software/hybrid-workspace/ for further reference.  

Contact us: hello@ones.software, or visit ONEs Software official website for more information: https://ones.software/. 

The post Zoom: Flexibility is at the heart of hybrid work first appeared on ONEs Blog.

What you should know

• A hybrid approach to work is the main focus of Google Singapore
• Flexibility is the key factor now to retaining your talents

Google’s Hybrid approach

Google first opened a Singapore office in 2007 — a tiny space in the business district — before moving to a new, purpose-built space in 2016. Singapore is now their Asia Pacific headquarters, located at the center of Asia’s vibrant digital economy, and home to more than 2,000 Googlers.

Recently, Google has announced its hybrid approach to work policy, which would like to provide enough flexibility and choice to their employees once they are able to return to our offices globally. 

In their announcement, they stated serval key principles that are worth studying:

A more flexible work week: 

Google will move to a hybrid work week where most Googlers spend approximately three days in the office and two days wherever they work best.

Since in-office time will be focused on collaboration, their product areas, and functions will help decide which days teams will come together in the office.

More choices around where people work: 

As one of Google’s biggest advantages is its global footprint, it allows people to pick another office whether business goals can be met in the new location and whether your team has the right infrastructure on the site to support your work. 

Also, Google support completely remote work based on people’s role and team needs. Before the pandemic, Google had thousands of people working in locations separate from their core teams. 

Now around 60% of Googlers are coming together in the office a few days a week, another 20% are working in new office locations, and 20% are working from home. 

Shared spaces and a close-knit community

Over the past few months, Google’s employees in Singapore have been gradually returning to their office, as local restrictions ease.

At the moment, only a small number of Googlers can work in the office at the same time, while others work from home. Based on Google’s global hybrid work strategy, Google Singapore emphasizes flexibility and gives its people additional alternatives for where and how they work in the future.

The reason why Google emphasizes the flexibility of employees can be revealed by a survey on IT people done by Github:

According to research, 79% of the aged 21-34 participants would consider fully remote working because they can have less stress without C-level execs monitoring and be much happier. They also reflected that flexible work can make them work more productively and creates higher-quality outcomes.

Moreover, 43% of people indicated they would consider a lower-paid role if it gave them greater schedule flexibility. The reason is that flexible work gives them more free time to pursue hobbies and other interests outside of work. 

As we can see, Google Singapore’s flexible workspace can improve their programmers’ productivity and prevent their Googlers from leaving.

How to implement a flexible workspace for your people like Google?

Hybrid work means a mixed working style of working at the office and working from home. You can allow your employee to have high flexibility to choose their desirable workspace.

ONES all-in-one smart office system can help you to easily implement hybrid working at ease.  You can easily perform virtual meetings, desk-hoteling and digital office management with our Room Booking, Desk Booking, and Visitor Management features. 

ONES Software now has a dedicated page to introduce a series of hybrid working measures to help you solve problems. You may wish to go to https://ones.software/sg/hybrid-workspace/ for further reference. 

Contact us: hello@ones.software, or visit ONES Software official website for more information: https://ones.software/sg/. 

The post Google Singapore: Focus on the flexibility of employees first appeared on ONEs Blog.