Between the push from companies mandating more in-person time in the workplace and the pull among employees wanting to remain remote, a middle ground has emerged that has already resulted in consequences for the national office market.
Since 2019, about 40% of remote-capable employees, or those who can do their jobs from home, have shifted from working entirely on-site to adopting a flexible arrangement that includes some mix of hybrid or remote work, according to a recent Gallup study.
Nearly 30% of remote-capable employees surveyed said they worked on a fully remote basis, a significant spike from the 8% slice that said they were exclusively remote in 2019.
With companies such as Meta, Goldman Sachs, Amazon, Disney and General Motors trying to get employees back to physical workspaces, hybrid work has evolved into the most common type of schedule for remote-capable employees. Half the Gallup survey respondents said their workweek was split between on-site and remote work, and most said they expected the arrangements to remain in place for the long term.
Company executives have said that hybrid work has become a fixture in their businesses. Eight in 10 Fortune 500 companies surveyed by Gallup reported that they had no plans to decrease remote work flexibility throughout the following year.
Hybrid work schedules these days often involve commuting to an office two or three days a week, typically on a Tuesday through Thursday schedule.
"Employees and employers have found a middle ground in hybrid work that appears to be working well when managed effectively and is a work arrangement nobody would have imagined prior to 2020," Gallup reported.