Working for home and the stimulation of the office coffee break

Two big outcomes for the world of work have resulted from the Covid-19 pandemic – the shift towards working from home and, in Ireland at least, a rise in labour force participation.
Between 2019 and 2023, the share of EU workers who worked from home at least part of the time went up from 15 per cent to 22 per cent; for Ireland the ratio rose from 22 per cent in 2019 to 37 per cent by 2023. Our already-flexible workplaces became even more so.
The difference in the share of people working from home may reflect a greater proportion of desk-based jobs in Ireland than elsewhere, particularly given the strong growth since 2019 in the IT and professional services sectors. Economies with a different sectoral mix, where more people work in farming, factories or restaurants, require a larger share of workers to physically attend the workplace.
It is reasonable to assume that greater flexibility would facilitate an increase in labour force participation, especially by those with younger children. Post-pandemic, the proportion of Irish women at work has risen, especially among 25-34-year-olds. That, in turn, has facilitated a rapid growth in the economy.
Elsewhere in Europe, opportunities to work from home have had a more limited impact on women’s job participation.
To what extent is having more people at work under flexible working arrangements counterbalanced by working shorter hours?
Here the Irish data differs depending on whether it is reported by employers or households. In both cases, there has been a reported fall in working hours post-pandemic. However, households report a bigger drop than do employers. This may be because some households perceive a shorter working day when they are only commuting to their kitchen table.
Increased flexibility of working has clearly been popular with employees and, in some cases, has reduced employers’ office costs. Productivity in the short term does not seem to be particularly affected but there may be longer-term consequences that are, as yet, difficult to quantify.
Many desk-based jobs require people to work collaboratively in teams. Working together is particularly important when people are trying to develop new ideas. While software, such as Zoom and Teams, is widely used for meetings and online co-working, much real collaboration and innovation occurs face to face, with a freer flow of ideas and discussion than virtual encounters.
Online, there is no scope for side discussions by individual participants. The Zoom chat function is no substitute for a real conversation. Issues that could be resolved through a quiet word, or taking someone for a coffee, may escalate or remain unresolved if communications are predominantly virtual or formal.
New staff may find it harder to settle in if their main engagement with colleagues is online, and they have limited opportunities to network.
In my own working life, I have found informal social encounters with work colleagues to be very important in developing new ideas. One of the reasons I found the Department of Finance a stimulating place to work, when I joined in 1972, was the tea club. This was the daily gathering of staff of all grades for a cuppa together in those larger office rooms that boasted a functioning socket for a kettle. People swapped information about their work alongside the usual gossip about sport and politics. That’s where I learned much of my economics. It was easy for those us who were more junior to seek informal advice from senior colleagues.
When I moved to the ESRI in 1984, it was at first a bit of a culture shock. Everyone worked in their individual offices, coffee was served at your desk from a trolley, and interaction between staff was limited.
Coming from a different tradition, I brought in a coffee percolator and opened my door midmorning. The aroma of coffee brought in my neighbours to chat about the events of the day – or to swap ideas about our different fields of research. Over time, the ESRI’s culture shifted from monastic individual research towards working together on joint projects, many of them conceived over a coffee.
The result was the ESRI’s research output trebled between 1985 and 2000, with only a modest rise in staffing.
In the long run, working mainly from home may prove costly unless ways are found to foster the informal interactions that build teamwork, stimulate new thinking and resolve issues. It may turn out that the most productive hours on the days in the office may be during the coffee break and the casual encounters at the water cooler, not those hours spent at the screen.