A new study of 61,000 Microsoft employees claims that the sudden shift to remote working had a profound effect on their work behaviours and output. Overall, remote workers spent less time in meetings, had fewer real time conversations and worked in more siloed ways. Crucially it found that there was a reduction in the strengths of ties between people and fewer networking opportunities. While not suggesting that office based work and remote work are necessarily better than the other, the study concludes that the drop in loose connections and chances of networking with other teams could have a negative impact on higher quality work outputs and working culture. (more…)

Hybrid working could bring nearly four million people “locked out” from work such as parents, carers and disabled people into the workforce and enable part-time workers to work more hours adding £48.3bn to the UK economy each year, according to a new study by Virgin Media O2 Business and the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr). (more…)

Poly has released research findings that claims to expose our ‘hybrid working secrets’. The survey, which was made up of 4,000 hybrid workers from the UK, France, and Germany, shines a light into new working behaviours and habits on and off camera. The findings suggest people may be suffering from ‘Home Comfort Syndrome’ as the lines between home and work blur. (more…)

‘Hybrid’ is the ideal working environment among Brits today, but twice as many workers would like to be 100 percent office-based than work permanently from home, according to the latest research from LifeSearch. (more…)

The CIPD is warning of the risks of potentially creating a two-tier workforce after its analysis of official data claims the use of different flexible working arrangements is unequal across the UK – with some areas exposed as ‘flexible working notspots’. (more…)