There's no going back to normal

 Stephen Barden follows up on the previous episode's theme of refleting

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Transcript

First of all, thank you very much for your feedback to our previous episode on flexible and hybrid working. Your warmth, thoughts and questions make all the difference – from this being a series of me talking about what I think is important to one where we both do.

 We also seem to have done some serious climbing up the management podcast charts in the US as well as the UK. We got to no 37 in the management charts in both countries., So thank you for that too.  

Last time I talked about some of the major issues that have emerged with hybrid and remote working and about what we are in danger of losing:- cohesive cultures, strong relationships and even the home as the safe space.  What I strongly recommended was that managements didn’t just knee jerk and go for one or the other – back to the office or totally remote – or even a sort of arbitrary percentage,  but actually used the opportunity to think deeply about what their organizations – and I stressed organizations as a whole– needed to thrive. 

“Really dig down”, I said, “and align the architecture of your organizations with what it is there to do.” So, some really serious critical thinking about the ideal structures, methods, relationships and behaviours that the organizations needed: – and also what people had gone through during the pandemic. Si not just getting the ducks in a row but the whole coop, as it were  

But I said, rather gloomily, that I didn’t think managements would do anything like that because they’ve become fixated on “getting back to normal” after all the disruption. Keeping the keel even. Even if the keel may be cracked. 

Well, as you may have read, a real-life case study fell into my lap a few days after we published that last episode, which I’d like to use to explore those themes a little more – and particularly around what I meant by doing what the organization needs.  

On September 5th, the consultancy firm PwC UK told its 26,000 employees that, from January 2025, partners and staff would be required to spend at least 3 days a week (or 60% of their time) in the office or at client sites. And what’s more, they would all be monitored to make sure they were obeying the new instruction.

Now PwC may well have conducted a really thoroughgoing process, analysing exactly what their business needed before making this change. I have no idea. But there are two things that caught my attention almost immediately:  

The first were the words “This feels right…”. UK Managing Partner, Laura Hinton said in the PwC press release: “This feels right for our business and right for our people, given our focus on client service, coaching, and learning and development.” 

Feel right? Was there any evidential data about whether it would be good for the business?  Any consultation? The change can’t have been because there’s been a drop in profits because PwC UK’s consolidated group- revenue, announced in August 2023, rose 16% year on year to £5.8bn. With increases across all business lines. 

So, unless something has really gone wrong in this fiscal year, “this feeling right” can’t have been prompted by a loss of business – by clients voting with their feet.  It may have been – but all I’ve got to go on – and more important what clients and staff have to go on – is a feeling. 

The other thing that gave me pause for thought was the fact that adherence to this new policy would be monitored – “policed,” as one news source unkindly put it. 

And that move is a very clear signal, intended or not, to both staff and partners: “we don’t trust you. We don’t trust you to do what you’ve been told.”

I was reminded of an article in 2021, in a LinkedIn Talent Blog, extolling PwC’s successful culture of work flexibility.  One of the tips from PWC’s former “People Experience Leader “in the US – Anne Donovan – to build a culture of work flexibility was “Ensure trust is baked in” – trust your people to do the job.

Now let me just remind you – and myself – that I’m not against putting more emphasis on working in-office, face to face – if it’s good for the organization. In fact, I’m not against any system as long as it is good for the organization. And for me – good for the organization - means, ensure that it’s good for a reasonable balance of all its stakeholders. 

But in order to do that, you really need to dig down and discover what is good. What is good for the business, the clients, the staff, the owners, the market. Think it through and then manage it through. 

PwC UK may well have done all that – but all I can see, as a business owner and therefore a potential client, is “feeling” and “no trust” – or at least a degree of mistrust..

And the two things that PwC say on their site that they do is provide “Trust Solutions and Consulting Solutions”. 

Managing change without solid evidence and reasoning or even consultation in an organization means that you end up with a very narrow range of options of how to ensure that the change is applied. You can either appeal to popular sentiment or you can enforce and monitor it. Popular sentiment can work when you’re offering something that your people really want -as in “Guys, we know this is what you want. So, we’re giving it to you.  

And it works best, of course, when you’ve consulted enough to know what your people actually do want. But popular things are not always good for the organization, and they’re rarely popular when you’re taking something away. 

You can also, as I said, manage by enforcement and monitoring… if the prevailing corporate or social culture supports it. A fairly extreme example would be Henry Ford’s tightly controlled production lines. 

Enforcement of workplace attendance can also work when the most important aspect of the job is to be on the premises. Where people are primarily paid for their actual presence, by the shift or the hour: hence clocking in and clocking out. 

But when you’re working in a knowledge industry, and you’ve already rolled out a system based on trust – albeit because the pandemic forced you to – you have to manage differently.

And by the way, I’ve now moved beyond the PwC case study because they’re not the only organization that is trying to get their employees back to the office – by hook or by crook.

For whatever reason, when you monitor people’s presence you are saying very clearly to them, “We don’t entirely trust you to deliver- so we want to see you delivering.” 

And of course, once you send that message, you get into the quagmire that starts with the question “Why?” Why do you mistrust them? After all, business continues to grow, clients aren’t walking away. Your people seem to have kept up their part of the bargain: they’ve worked in a hybrid way, and they – on the face of it – appear to have kept up productivity. (In fact, my good friend Chat GPT tells me that all the big consultancy companies have experienced strong growth in 2023-24.) By telling your people that you don’t trust them – even though that may not be your intention – you’re also stripping them of at least a layer of ownership, responsibility and loyalty. Is that important? It is in the knowledge industries. You’re asking me to use my knowledge, my intellect, my relationships and my skills but you’re saying you only trust me to do so – when you can see me. So, you, literally, only trust me as far as you can see me? Ok, then. I don’t trust you either. 

There’s another message you may be sending as a manager. You don’t trust yourself to manage people unless you control their space in some way. You don’t trust yourself to manage your people unless they’re on the production line. And yes, I am implying that we’re still running organizations – including those in the knowledge sector - as if they were direct evolutions of the production line. 

Now here’s the irony. You can by-pass this entire trust debate by going through the review I talked about. By looking at what is best for the organization – as a whole.

By cleverly constructing working groups to look at different aspects of your organization, its purpose and its business; by including key players; by aligning everything with what is good for the organization as a whole. By doing all that you strengthen, not weaken, trust. 

 I keep on saying that this sort of review is not difficult. It isn’t. It’s rigorous, it’s comprehensive but it’s not difficult. Difficult is when you meet resistance and hostility. There’s resistance and anxiety when those affected have no say in change – or worse, when they have no say and they see the flaws in the plan but can do nothing constructive about it.  In my experience, most people welcome taking part in reshaping their organizations.  They may moan and groan a bit - but once you start, it turns into an extraordinarily energetic and creative process. Come on, you’re actually asking your people to help shape the way they’re going to work for the next decade or so – all in the best interests of the entire business, including themselves.  What’s not to like?  

And remember, the recommendation is not – necessarily- to change the business: it’s to review the way you structure and operate it: 

Ah, I hear you say. “This will take time. And money. And attention. That could all be better used to increasing our business now. For goodness’ sake, man. Has nobody told you that we’ve been through hell and we need to get back to normal? “

Let’s take those arguments one by one:

Time: Developing the design, the process and the outcome of change takes time. But it takes a lot less time, money and disruption than what you’ll waste if you jump in boots and all. 

Money? My first response is – I hope so. If it’s worth doing it’s worth spending on. 

However, clearly a programme that looks to refocus the business for the long term would cost much less some of your current annual programmes that do little more than spin the wheel a little faster.

And here’s the final piece. Normal? There is no normal. Normal – as the German automobile industry amongst many others are finding out – is another word for hanging on to what worked – in the past. In the last 15 years, we have had our personal lives, social norms and commercial models ruptured by a massive financial crisis, a  global pandemic, the shifting of global political axes,  and technological and AI advancements – all of which have shifted not only the attitudes and expectations of individuals, but the requirements, tools and organization of our businesses and – something I haven’t touched on at all here – the institutions to which we look for support. 

So, here’s where I would like to end this: 

The whole flexible working debate is such a good opportunity to review the most effective ways of working, particularly in the Knowledge Industries. And the debate should not just be about hybrid or in-office; not just about flexible or fixed hours. It is the ideal time to think about and design how our organizations and the people in them can operate most effectively and fruitfully in the market, the context, in which we now find ourselves. Which is a lot different from what it was even five years ago. And fiddling with flexible working or faddling with feelings is not going to help. 

I'm Stephen Barden, this has been another episode of "The Power of Balance".