Career, culture and creativity: the lost opportunities of the office
Key moments of human interaction are lost when working from home, writes Havas Media Group head of integrated strategy and planning Nick Kavanagh.
I’ve just started to emerge from my Covid-enforced work hibernation. Although there’s a smattering of people on our floor at the Havas Village HQ, the view from my desk is mainly of blank screens, empty chairs, and scribbles on whiteboards for campaigns and pitches long-gone. Ghosts of a more collaborative past.
As a management team we’re now trying to encourage our people back to the office. It’s February already and like every agency in town, we have targets to meet and clients to service. We need to get going.
But a lot of our people are reticent to return and the reasons for this are as broad as they are understandable.
Missing the office dog lifestyle as well, been barking up the wrong tree having my human work from home for so long, its been pretty *ruff*. Looking forward to the next Havas dog day and paw-sible see you there Nick
Great article, Nick. Concur with much of the sentiment. Solid points well made. Clearly WFH works at a day-in, day-out level for many of us. But pan out and consider how this impacts our ability to connect, collaborate and be part of something bigger than ourselves…there’s lots for us to figure out. Cheers, Nick
Funny how all these “Work is better in an office environment” articles are always penned by the management class who benefit from the surveillance and prestige of being surrounded physically by their underlings.
Thanks but no thanks.
I firmly believe most agency staff, especially those in the early stage so of their careers, have many more opportunities to learn, gain wider experience, be promoted, be paid more and develop the skills needed to become one of the ‘management class’ if they work at the office and not at home. [And if you’re worried about ‘surveillance’, it’s worth remembering if you WFH that most companies have the right to access your work computer/online activity to confirm proof of work done and the time spent doing it]. So, if one day, you hope to enjoy ‘the prestige of being surrounded physically by your underlings’ and all the extra income and benefits that come with your elevation to the ‘management class’, I suggest working from the office might well one of the best and fastest ways of achieving it.
As of right now, for all multi-office organisitons, if you don’t know how to lead and develop remote teams then you don’t really know how to lead. Horse has bolted.
@Michael – If that was your takeout from this article, I would suggest you’re not the type of person any leader would want in a team, WFH or not.
The comments on this post illustrate the best reason why physical presence is an important ingredient to any group, culture, organisation, club etc…
– Greater context in everyday interactions
– Clear (er) communication and nuanced comprehension
– There is a greater tendency for increased ownership, thoughtfulness and accountability within individuals when it comes to displaying anti-social, aggressive or negative behaviours, actions and most importantly, reactions, towards others who may disagree, challenge, dismiss or otherwise somehow threaten our own belief and value systems.
Isn’t “learning by osmosis” indicative of the lack of a (useful and actually followed) structured learning or mentorship program common to all agencies? I was a “Director” in two of the global agency groups and can say I was never taught how to mangage or develop anyone. In agencies, I believe it’s fair to say “management” is a title, not a skill. We do create close friendships in-office of course, but I’ve also cultivated friendships with my equivalents in London and the US whilst working on shared global accounts. We haven’t met in person yet, but plan to as soon as we can. Work is often more fun together, but only when you like who you sit with. Sometimes you just don’t. I don’t believe a future-focused organisation can chance their culture and creativity on (literally) chance micro-interactions in a noisy, open plan room. Is the organisation’s creativity and cuture being led by a narrow selection of the loudest and most senior voices, or the organisation’s best? As an industry group we have to get better at leading people remotely. When my fellow 10-year vets are complaining about city cost of living and commuting, remember we earn 3-5x what our juniors do and it is serious for them. They and next wave of talent will be voting with their feet.