When I think of everything my colleagues have faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, one word comes to mind: agile. Our professionals have risen to the occasion, quickly and without complaint. They adapted to an almost-exclusive work-from-home environment; they made our clients their North Star; and they showed that we can deliver value and quality while working virtually across time and space. In short, they thrived in the unknown. Now, as we re-imagine the future of work at our firm, I’ve told our team that we won’t be fully returning to our old office-centric ways. Here’s why.
Flexible and personal: It’s possible
When the pandemic struck, we immediately identified three broad priorities to guide all our decisions: We resolved to take care of our people, be there for our clients, and keep our business strong. We’ve succeeded in balancing those priorities throughout the pandemic, and they continue to guide us today.
To be sure, it hasn’t been easy. We’ve seen that remote work can take a mental and emotional toll on people. It can also make it harder to build culture and community. These are matters we take seriously. So, how can we build a hybrid workplace that responds to the needs of our clients, our colleagues and our business?
Our answer is to be thoughtful and flexible as we reshape the “future of work” at our firm. Just as we have learned that our people can work effectively from anywhere, we have also learned that our 8,500 teammates have different comfort levels with returning to face-to-face interactions, different needs for in-person contact and different family responsibilities. Throughout the pandemic, they have found value in creating new ways to balance their work and personal lives. We want to preserve that value.
This is why, even as we lift pandemic-related restrictions on face-to-face interactions, we will not require attendance in our offices or at client sites for every business situation.
In other words, when clients need to meet us in person, and it makes sense for us to do so, we’ll be there. The same goes for client events, practice development and local internal gatherings. At the same time, our team members will have the option to handle meetings or day-to-day tasks remotely whenever it is appropriate to do so. By keeping an open and honest dialogue with our people, we will combine the best of the past and the present to shape a better workplace for the future. We know this flexible approach can succeed — because we’re already there.
Focus on people, not offices
In many ways, the pandemic simply accelerated existing workplace trends. For example, physical offices have grown in importance as a social hub for training and collaboration — but have waned as a place for people to work in closed rooms eight hours a day. That said, our offices will always be available for clients and staff who need them, and people will be free to work and meet as they see fit. And even though many staff may not be on-site and in person every single day, the office will continue to be an important gathering place for learning, working together, building culture and socializing.
This flexible approach is what our people want: 78% of our teammates who responded to a recent survey said they do not need to be in an office full-time to be productive. It’s also what our future Grant Thornton team members want: Recent Gallup polling indicates that younger professionals are more engaged with their firms when they can work remotely. In addition, 79% of millennials in a recent survey from ManpowerGroup listed workplace flexibility as a top priority when looking for a job.
And, critically, this is also what our clients want. An almost-unanimous 98% told us in a recent survey that our remote-work model has been effective during the COVID-19 pandemic. Most said it is only important for us to be with them in person at important inflection points of major projects. And almost 70% would prefer to work with us on a hybrid basis moving forward.
We are confident this new approach to “the future of work” will make our firm more effective, more efficient and more competitive. Most important, it will give our people and our clients the flexibility they’ve told us they want. Because no matter what that future holds, our clients will always need — and deserve — happy, dedicated and productive people.
