Ask Sanyin: How Can We Shift the Return-to-Office Conversation

It’s been five years since the start of the pandemic, and we’re still debating a return to the office. I know that being together physically is important for communication and connection. How can I bring employees back to the office in a way that responds to their needs rather than being seen as “command and control”?

You are so right in focusing on the need for connection and human flourishing. While the return-to-office (RTO) debate has focused on worker productivity, for most companies productivity has been stable or has improved, regardless of whether employees have been working from home or in the office.

Putting productivity at the heart of this conversation has also centered the issue of trust. Employees receive the morale-killing message that leaders doubt their judgment, commitment, and work ethic and that they don’t deserve the autonomy that is key to genuine engagement and high performance. That’s the tension at the heart of the current debate.

There are plenty of companies where a command-and-control mentality reigns. But at the same time, there are many leaders who, like you, are concerned about organizational culture and important elements of employee well-being like connectedness at work. We need to reframe the request to spend more time in a shared workplace as a response to the needs of our people, not a power play.

Focus on the importance of human-to-human interaction to sustain a healthy culture, build trusting workplace relationships, and collaborate better on certain aspects of work. At the same time, it’s important to acknowledge the lived reality that some parts of a job, like deep-focus work, may be done as well or better from home. If you are open to a mix of in-person and remote work, supporting such options will boost your credibility.

Time spent working in the same place together is not just about making the work better — it’s about employee well-being. A landmark 2023 report from former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy warned about a loneliness epidemic with real health consequences for Americans. The antidote is to come back to what humans have been wired to do since our ancestors sat around campfires under the stars, telling stories and looking each other in the eye.