The unexpected nostalgia for the office

It is almost unspeakable, but there are already people who would like to return to the office, fed up with teleworking and even sad to be alone at home.

Others are delighted, but there are those who take it badly and the experts have an explanation, which is something like when your partner leaves you: an emotional bond is broken.

“I am organizing some

team

sessions

and the company has just called me to ask if it can be in person, because it turns out that all its employees have asked;

they want to see each other, be together, share something ”, explains Manel Fernández Jaria, specialist in Well-being at Work at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC).

“It is absolutely normal, there has been an emergency adaptation to a very complicated situation, but now psycho-emotional planning is needed to maintain the link with the company.

Companies are already noticing it and they have to start working on it, so that people feel the warmth of the organization and the teams ”, says this specialist in raising morale in companies and improving their motivation.

In this situation, Fernandez Jaria points out that regular face-to-face meetings can be useful in order not to lose contact between people, and also the solution that seems to have more future: combining teleworking and the office, in formulas of four days and one, or three and two, during the week.

"Creativity, ideas, only arise from direct contact."

More information

• Teleworking was not what we were told: how we have come to live without ever disconnecting

• Why does the head of Netflix want to go back to the office?

A Morning Consult study published in the

this month indicates that 58% of Americans who telecommute feel disconnected from their colleagues, and 44% feel more alone and isolated working the day at home.

The whole part of social life that involves work, conversations, friends, breaks, coffees and the human environment is missed.

Stripped of company, it all comes down to productivity.

“If everything boils down to mail orders, or virtual meetings, the affective bond is weakened, the commitment is diluted.

This is widely studied in social psychology: a low engagement rate leads to a high turnover rate, many leave, and the best tend to leave.

This link must be encouraged ”, explains Francisco Díaz Bretones, professor of Social Psychology at the Faculty of Labor Relations at the University of Granada and coordinator of the WISE research group (

).

The issue is even more complex when you consider that those who return to an office do so to places that are not what they were, and that can also be another disappointing experience.

For example, walking through the financial area of ​​Azca, in the center of Madrid, at this moment, gives a desolate feeling among half-empty skyscrapers.

“It's a bit depressing.

I work here, in Torre Europa, where there are about 30 or 40 companies, but this is dead, everything is empty ”, says Daniel Valdrés, 28, from Kraft-Heinz.

He smokes on the terrace of one of the many bars in the area that have run out of customers.

"At this time this was usually full of people, look now."

In your company there are 80 employees and about 10 go every day, one or two days each a week.

They have to notify a week before they go, to organize their shifts well, because there is a capacity limit, in case there is a positive and thus be able to locate their colleagues on duty.

“I have been grateful to return, for having a little contact, interacting, seeing my colleagues.

The routine is good, it gives you a bit of rhythm, it's important, ”says Sergio, 40, who works at Deloitte in the next door skyscraper, Torre Picasso.

The employees of this firm say that less than half have returned, there is a medical service that controls everything, in the meeting rooms there can be no more than two people and in each place there is a QR code that must be registered when entering, so that at all times it is known where each one is and how many people are in each space.

Nobody knows what will happen, but the idea that is prevailing is that perhaps nothing will ever be the way it was.

“This has changed forever, it is not that we are going to go back to the old thing, because companies have discovered that telecommuting is very profitable.

It will go to mixed formulas, semi-presential, because companies are also seeing problems arise, losses are probably going to skyrocket.

Due to psychosomatic disorders, anxiety, muscle problems ... ”, says Díaz Bretones.

He comments that there are already mutual companies that are beginning to offer psychological assistance for employees, because they need to talk and tell a professional about their low spirits.

The need to get out of the house and separate it from work is driving new clients to the

premises

.

“Many are coming who left and also new ones, and we are offering them alternatives, so that they can come two or three days, if from Monday to Friday they cannot afford it.

At first we all went to work

, and now we are slowly coming back ”, reasons Sonia Felipe, Marketing Director of Impact Hub, a network of

spaces

established around the world.

Their headquarters have never closed in these months, although during the confinement the influx collapsed, but they say that since the end of August many clients began to return.

“The house fell on them, due to a need to connect, working remotely alone is very hard.

Small companies,

, look for spaces to rotate teams, to see each other from time to time, to hold meetings ”, he explains.

A particular hero of this chain is a client of his center in the Prosperidad neighborhood: he kept going to work there all the quarantine, by himself, because at home he had three children and it was the only way.

A study by Impact Hub among its users indicates that almost 80% will now adopt hybrid models, combining office and teleworking.

In any case, it is being difficult for companies to face this new scenario, since they lose the perception of the collective mood of their workforce.

Fernandez Jaria usually does an emotional X-ray with self-diagnostic applications.

Each employee marks on their phone, anonymously, how they find each day between different color options, from boredom and anger to happiness.

"If you find that 70% of your workers are in a low tone or depressed, then you have a problem, right?"

Towards a new job relocation?

But the distance between the company and the worker can go much further.

In June, when the new law to regulate teleworking began to take shape, the president of the CEOE, Antonio Garamendi, expressed his discomfort at possible too rigid regulations and warned: “If impossible conditions are put on me, tomorrow I can hire in Portugal ”.

Later, the government, employers and unions reached an agreement to regulate teleworking, but this threat indicates how far one can go.

"The next step in teleworking may be the total relocation of the workforce, not the companies," says Francisco Díaz Bretones.

It has been common for years to call a helpline and have them respond from another continent, but the emergence of remote work has revealed that practically anything can be done remotely.

"And why hire in Spain if I can do it in another country paying half the salary?"

It is possible to go further, as is being done by Estonia, the most digitized country in the world and a pioneer in this field.

In order to attract workers, companies and talents, since 2014 it has granted the so-called virtual or digital residence to citizens from outside the EU.

There are more records of new digital Estonians than there are actual births of Estonians.

Professionals from the technology, financial and consulting sectors, as well as companies, operate from the Baltic country.

They benefit from entering the European legal framework and low taxation, and Estonia, from its economic impact.

It does not give the right to nationality, or automatically to tax residence, or an entry permit to the EU, but they do not need it.