Microsoft: Bosses believe employees are less productive at home
Workers see it the other way
A new report by Microsoft on work trends shows that the majority of managers are concerned that the productivity of their team members suffers when they are allowed to work from home.
The report, which is based on an extensive survey of 20,000 employees across 11 countries, found that while 87% of workers thought they worked just as efficiently, or even more efficiently, from home, 12% of bosses said they have full confidence that their teams are being productive.
In the survey, 85% of bosses said that hybrid working has made it challenging to have confidence in their workers' productivity.
The report, Work Trend Index, points out a phenomenon known as 'productivity theatre', the act of trying to appear to be busy, that results from employers measuring employees' activity rather than the impact of their work.
According to Microsoft, some companies are using technology to track workers' activity, which might result in employees lacking 'context on how and why they're being tracked.'
This is likely to erode trust and result in productivity theatre, the report says.
This phenomenon further leads to 'productivity paranoia' where employers believe that lost productivity is caused by the staff not working, even though hours worked, number of meetings, and other activity metrics have increased.
The report warns that productivity paranoia poses a risk to hybrid work; it advises managers to stop worrying about whether their staff are working and rather start assisting them in focusing on the most crucial tasks.
Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, told the BBC that this tension needed to be addressed as it is unlikely that companies will ever return to the working patterns they had before the epidemic.
"We have to get past what we describe as productivity paranoia, because all of the data we have that shows that 80% plus of the individual people feel they're very productive - except their management thinks that they're not productive.
"That means there is a real disconnect in terms of the expectations and what they feel."
Ryan Roslansky, CEO of LinkedIn, said companies are coping with what may be the most significant upheaval in working habits in the history.
During the pandemic, there was an immense increase in the number of fully-remote jobs listed on LinkedIn; but Roslansky said that data indicated that trend might have peaked.
About 2% of the 14 or 15 million job advertisements that are regularly live on LinkedIn involved remote working before the pandemic, he said. A few months ago, that number was at 20%, but as of this month, it has dropped down to 15%.
In recent months, many companies have struggled in implementing new working arrangements for their employees.
At Apple, there has been pushback against calls to return to the office three days a week beginning in September.
On the other hand, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has demanded that his employees spend 40 hours a week in the office. In an email sent to employees, he said, "If you don't show up, we will assume you have resigned".
Microsoft workers are permitted to work from home up to 50% of the time. Anything beyond that needs management approval or a switch to part-time employment.
Microsoft's analysis also revealed that workers are eager for growth prospects. More than half of employees said that their company does not provide enough prospects for personal growth to make them think about long-term employment.
Employees often believe that changing jobs is the best way to advance their skills. The percentage increases as one moves up the corporate ladder, with 51% of lower and entry-level workers, 66% of upper and mid-level managers and 69% of executives thinking that way.