“People who use flexible work styles such as telecommuting or working from home may be seen as not focusing on their own business, but putting family and personal life first,” Kimberly Edelston, professor of entrepreneurship and innovation at Northeastern University, Boston (Kimberly Eddleston) said. Author of a study that measures the relationship between remote work and career success through promotions and salary increases.

This LearnReleased before the COVID-19 pandemic, studied a large American technology company whose employees work remotely and on-site. The data has been analyzed for six years. Although the authors did not find a significant difference in the number of promotions between people who work in the office and those who “remotely work”, they found that the more people who work from home, the more they see a salary increase. The less likely it is.

“We found that especially in terms of wage growth, and even promotion, were severely punished,” Eddleston said of those who choose to work from home a few days a week.

Peer pressure back to the office?

For those who aim to continue to avoid returning to the office full-time, professional “punishment” is clearly unwelcome.According to Statistics Canada, in a survey conducted in April, a full 80% of participants said they were willing to spend at least half of their time Working time from home After the epidemic is over.

Carlos Sayao has been working from home for the past 15 months and plans to accept a mixed work week from his employer. He said he was not worried that this choice would hurt his career in any way.

“I don’t feel any pressure from peers to enter the office just to come in,” said the 38-year-old lawyer of Toronto law firm Tyr LLP.

He and his partner even moved to a larger house, which has more space for them to work.Sayau said that the pandemic has shown how efficient employees work outside of the office.

“I think the stigma must have been greatly reduced,” he said. “In today’s day and age, I don’t think there should be barriers to working from home just to face each other in the office.

Hybrid problem

Jon Love disagreed. The CEO of Toronto-based KingSett Capital has a vested interest in returning to work full-time; he is in the commercial real estate business. But he said that this is not the reason why he believes that most employees will eventually return to the office.

“In my experience, it is difficult to have a mixed environment,” said 66-year-old Love. “In the final analysis, I think business is a team sport, and it is difficult for only a part of the team to participate in it.”

He is one of those people who believe that the best form of collaboration is in person, and video calling is a second-rate alternative. Love described a situation where eight people gathered in person, while the other four people joined the meeting through Zoom on the big screen.

“The problem is that eight people talk to each other, just like four people are at the children’s dining table. It doesn’t work at all. No one wants to sit at the children’s dining table — and you never hear the kids talking anyway. Say.”

Love said the pandemic has forced the remote work experience to be successful, but as vaccination rates rise, he expects most companies will eventually want employees to return to their desks. He pointed out that New York, London, and Sydney, Australia are commercial centers where people have returned to their offices in large numbers, and that Canada is likely to follow suit, once it is declared safe to do so.

“Most employers want their employees to come back,” he said.

He also saw that those who choose to live near the comfort of their homes may pay for their careers. “There is an old saying-90% of the success has occurred.”

Old prejudice

But is this sentence out of date now? Jim Bunting thinks so.

“Today, it must be revised to ‘90% of success lies in putting into work,” said Bunting, the founder of Carlos Sayao’s law firm. “It doesn’t matter whether this work is done in the office or outside the office.”

Bunting said that because of the international nature of his work, he is very confident that he can work anywhere, even before the pandemic. He said that the hybrid model is particularly suitable for the legal industry, and insisted that his employees will not be punished for choosing to spend time on home workstations.

“Our leadership team has the responsibility to be thoughtful and fair when evaluating performance, and to ensure that we eliminate old views or prejudices that associate success with facing time,” he said.

There is evidence that the pandemic has changed people’s attitudes to some extent.LinkedIn grade Canadian companies assess the extent to which professionals can advance their careers every year, and stated that most of the top 25 companies this year “plan to change their permanent policies to allow more remote operations after the pandemic And flexible work-if they don’t have it,” it’s not already done. “

The study’s co-author, Kimberly Eddleston, studied the relationship between the frequency of working from home and the level of professional success, and he has some suggestions for people who want the best of both worlds.

First, she said that it is important to maintain close contact with the supervisor. “You need to communicate and really let them know that you are more efficient at home and that you are doing things well.”

She pointed out that “norms” in the workplace are the key. “If everyone in your unit returns to work, it needs to be considered,” she said. “Maybe you should come in more.” On the other hand, if everyone works from home three days a week, then you can also do it safely.

Her research also concluded that those who work from home only occasionally (about once a week) achieve the same professional success as those who do not work at all. “So this is something we all want to be able to think about and adapt to,” she said.