This transcription is provided by artificial intelligence. We believe in technology but understand that even the smartest robots can sometimes get speech recognition wrong.

  Today in Health it, this story is companies wrestling with remote work models. My name is Bill Russell. I'm a former CIO for a 16 hospital system and creator of this week in Health IT a channel dedicated to keeping health IT staff current. I. And engaged. I wanna thank our sponsor for today's Sirius Healthcare.

They reached out to me about this time last year and said, Hey, we love what you're doing and we really appreciate your mission to develop the next generation of health leaders. The rest is history, and we are really happy to have Sirius as a sponsor. If you believe in our mission and want to support the show, please shoot me a note at Partner at this weekend, health it.com.

All right. Here's today's story. This is from the Wall Street Journal over the weekend, uh, really good article on remote work and, and how it's impacting companies. This isn't healthcare specifically, but it's really about how the hybrid work plans are creating awkward kinds of challenges for employers, large employers, and the like.

The title of the article is Companies Wrestled with Hybrid Work Plans, awkward Meetings, and Midweek Crowding. Again, this is the Wall Street Journal. Big US companies are discovering that hybrid work comes with plenty of complications as employees firm up plans to bring white collar workers back into the office while still allowing them to do some work from home.

Many are encountering obstacles. Companies are grappling with what new schedules employees should follow. Where people should sit in redesigned offices and how best to prevent employees at home from feeling left out of impromptu office discussions or being passed over for opportunities. Says chief executives, board directors, and others, the insurer, Prudential Financial.

Which expects most of its roughly 42,000 employees to work in the office half of the time starting after Labor Day. Once it makes certain, not all staffers choose to stay home Monday and Friday, then work in the office midweek at the travel company. Expedia group executives are trying to figure out how to have in-person meetings that don't disadvantage those who aren't in the room.

Other employers, including the software company, Twilio, predict that a new era of work could lead. Shuffling between teams with staffers gravitating to bosses who embrace their preferred styles of working. Alright, so you have those things going on. Let's go on. The new style of work is bound to be a transition for workers who a year ago had to adjust to life at home, though executives say.

It would be easier to manage if every employee returned to an office or all stayed remote. Surveys have repeatedly shown that most workers want a mixed approach as more adults are vaccinated. In a February survey of a thousand companies commissioned by LaSalle Network, a national staffing and recruiting firm, the majority of companies said they would adopt a hybrid model.

All right, so th there's gonna be a lot about the so what here of getting this right and. So survey the employees, understand the market trends. These are some of the, so what's from this? This is something you really have to get right. I'm gonna come back to that in a minute. I'm gonna keep going in this article.

Companies have also polled their organization to find out how employees feel at Prudential. Most employees indicated that they enjoyed working remotely, but missed the planning, ideation, and collaboration that takes place in person, says Rob Falzone. So that's . One thing people do miss that ideation that, that, uh, running into each other and having those impromptu meetings.

Prudential has been redesigning its office space floor by floor, so they're redesigning their spaces to accommodate this new kind of remote work environment. People feel like this is the future and they are already moving to get out of a bunch of commercial real estate that they own. And to update that space for a new type of work environment.

Like many employers, the company is reducing its physical footprint and there won't be available desks for people who want to go to the office more frequently with expectations for some employees, including traders. I. We don't have a desk for you every day. Mr. Falzone says We have a desk for you three days a week.

Hybrid models range by company, technology company, Adobe Plans to allow employees to work from home up to two to three days a week with staffers able to make reservations for office desks, says Gloria Chen, the company's Chief people Officer. Other companies are hesitant to put out specific numbers on days allowed at home.

Factors, including the length of the commute type of job and employee seniority could determine how often an employee needs to visit the office. Executives say anything else in this prominent type companies are embracing remote work in the midst of the exodus of skilled labor. From Silicon Valley, again, this is another thing to consider.

Where are you? How is this impacting your community? With flexibility comes challenge. If a team comes together in person, but not all can make it, that potentially creates a subpar experience. For those not in the room says Expedia, CEO, Peter Kern. The travel company opened the first phase of an expansive campus complete with wifi equipped rocks on the shores of sea, uh, Seattle's Elliot Bay before the pandemic, and plans to initially permit spaced group team meetings at its headquarters.

Mr. Kern though says he has questions about whether those. On Zoom, we'll get the same level of learning, encouragement, and career growth as those in the in the room. Managers may need to set up group meetings according to some crazy algorithm of who's available when, who's got a flexible day, when Mr.

Kern says there's a lot of friction in all that, and it's a lot easier to say, everybody go to work now. Someone calls a meeting and you're all there. All right. That's enough from the article. Let's talk about the so what? This is something you have to get right? There's a major shift going on in the world.

People are making life decisions based on their quality of life, which I guess is a life decision. If you mishandle this, you may find yourself losing staff, struggling to attract staff and missing out on major trends that are going on in your industry. Look at the national movements, but recognize that not.

Every geography is going to experience this the same. What is a challenge for a major city like New York might be a windfall for a nice spread out city like Raleigh, North Carolina. You may benefit from people wanting to live in open spaces with parks and no elevators to get to your home or to your bedroom.

I was talking to a realtor yesterday in my town of Naples, Florida. The normal inventory in our subdivision is about 30 homes Today that number is zero. Zero, no homes are for sale in our subdivision. I asked him where these people are coming from and he said the Northeastern cities, Boston, and New York.

And then he paused and said. You know what? Chicago, Minneapolis as well. I asked him if people were retiring early. His comment, not necessarily. These are younger people snatching up these homes with aspirations of remote work from a place with no snow. This is something you have to get right? Take your time, survey your staff.

Understand the national and local trends and how they might impact your hiring practices. If you're an employee, you have a decision to make as well. How often are you gonna go into the office? There is something about career development that is missed by doing Zoom meetings that you're not gonna get unless you're in the office.

Those impro two run-ins with the, uh, boss, with the executives that are running a specific project that invite you onto their project. I. Perhaps the world will change, but that has defined my career. It is conversations in the hallway. It's invitations to a meeting that I normally wouldn't attend. It is opportunity that you get by going to lunch with somebody and conversations you have with other team members.

It's ideas that come up as a result of those impromptu meetings. I'm not saying that you have to go back to work five days a week, but I am saying. That there is the potential of missing something that might really propel your career forward. If you were a family member of mine, if you were my son, I might say to you.

Don't take the easy way out. Just because you like working from home doesn't necessarily mean that's what's best for you. You may want to go into the office four days this week. You may want to go into the office two days this week, but really weigh the cost. There is a cost of not interacting with people face-to-face.

You may believe that. You may not believe that maybe it's a concept from a day gone by. But my experience would tell me that there are opportunities that happen in the hallway. There are opportunities that happen at lunch. There are opportunities that only happen face-to-face. That's all for today. If you know of someone that might benefit from our channel, please forward them a note.

They can subscribe on our website this week, health.com or wherever you listen to Apple, Google Overcast, Spotify, Stitcher. You get the picture. We are everywhere. By the way, we've revamped our website. We're trying to unlock the value of three and a half years of content, of industry conversations and interviews, and you know, 400 of those over that timeframe.

And we're trying to unlock that so people can get access to that great content. And we wanna thank our channel sponsors who are investing in our mission to develop the next generation of health leaders. VMware Hillrom, Starbridge Advisors, McAfee and Aruba Networks. Thanks for listening. That's all for now.