Working from home: what do we really think?
As the industry gets into the swing of a new working year, employers and their staff will be hoping they’ve seen the last of covid lockdowns.
But as the impact of the pandemic continues to fade, one aspect that appears to be here to stay is greater flexibility in the workplace.
After long periods of enforced home working, when the job still got done, most employees have retained the option of working from home at least some of the time.
Major insurers and brokers are all singing from the same hymn sheet – staff can work from home for part of the week, as long as their role allows, and in consultation with their team leader.
But not everyone thinks the “hybrid model”, as it’s become known, is the answer to all our problems.
SME researcher Ross Cameron recently conducted a series of interviews with business owners, which revealed “frustration” from many who are allowing it only because they know where the power is in the current employment environment.
“People would walk,” is the blunt prediction from one industry source, when asked what would happen if insurance companies insisted on a strict return to five days in the office.
So employers are coming along for the WFH ride – but that doesn’t mean they’re all happy about it.
“I don’t like it in the slightest. I think it’s a great con, a complete con,” one business owner told Mr Cameron.
“If you’re working from home two days a week it really means you’re only working a three-day week,” said another.
And while insurance industry feedback suggests Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays are “by far” the most popular days to work in the office, there’s suspicion around that trend.
“You cannot just work Tuesday-Thursday and have a four-day weekend,” one respondent says.
Others are more balanced in their views, but there is general consensus that training, building culture and collaborative working are problem areas.
“This business is all about culture – a consulting business, it’s all about having spirit and a collective endeavour, walking arm-in-arm in the same direction,” one of Mr Cameron’s respondents (an insurance broker) said.
“So I feel strongly about seeing people here. Having said that, the company has had to move with the times and there are a number of people that are working from home at least two days a week – in fact most of the staff are.”
insuranceNEWS.com.au’s own research found the insurance industry to be very supportive of hybrid working. All of the companies we spoke to, large or small, backed the change – believing it to be a genuine improvement for both employers and employees.
Most want some days where teams can meet up, and for staff to spend about 50% of the time in the office. But they don’t see any problem with retaining an element of home working.
Productivity can be measured even if managers aren’t in the same building, and if you don’t trust your staff it’s a sign that you’ve employed the wrong people.
“I do agree that you can’t build culture if you are working 100% remotely,” Lisa Carter, MD of Queensland-based brokerage Clear Insurance, tells insuranceNEWS.com.au.
“For training and development you need two days a week in the office, minimum. But those work from home days are good for productivity.
“The hybrid model is the best of both worlds.”
Ms Carter says flexibility greatly benefits working mums – studies have shown that women still take on the greatest share of childcare duties.
“Staff are happier if they can put their families first,” she says. “They will be more loyal.”
And she believes women whose careers may previously have been held back by domestic expectations now have greater opportunity to progress.
“We strive to be an employer of choice that truly supports women. It comes down to trusting your team to get the job done while giving them the flexibility to manage family life. It’s not about disapproving looks or cold emails just because they had to take an hour to look after a sick child.”
NSW-based GSA Insurance Brokers has this summer introduced a nine-day fortnight for interested staff. It’s an effort to give back after a tough few years, and prioritise family time and wellbeing.
The trial runs from December to February and feedback will be sought before deciding whether to repeat in future years.
“We’ve asked the staff to make up the hours from the extra day off across the other nine days, but really it’s a trust thing,” Head of Business Development Charles Galayini tells insuranceNEWS.com.au.
“As long as the work gets done that’s the main thing. We’ve had the lockdowns and some pretty ordinary weather, so we wanted to help staff get the most out of this summer.”
GSA allows staff to work one day a week from home, with the potential for more with management approval.
“Time in the office can be more effective and better for culture,” Mr Galayini says. “But that element of flexibility allows a better work/life balance.”
Richard Crawford, CEO of authorised representative network CBN, tells insuranceNEWS.com.au that showing intent is key, wherever staff are based.
“You can work from home, you can work from the office, but you have to be intentional,” he says. “People are capable of hanging around the office and doing nothing.”
Mr Crawford believes that when collaboration is required, such as an underwriter needing to seek guidance from a more senior colleague around a complex risk, remote working can be tricky.
“Communication can slip if you need to refer to someone else,” he said.
“You can’t escalate or collaborate with a second phone call or email, whereas if you’re in the office you can say ‘hey, have you got a minute’. There’s that coaching moment when the expert comes over and the job gets done. You can’t do that in the same way on the internet.”
Mr Crawford agrees that team-building and training work better in the office. “The learning is far faster and better in the physical environment.” But he has no particular productivity concerns with people working from home.
“We have to change the way we lead, and the way we trust people, and the way we recruit. As well as recruiting for skills, equally or more important is cultural fit, so that you can be confident staff are doing what you need them to do, wherever they are working from.”
Mr Cameron says his research indicates most business owners “aren’t big fans” of WFH.
“They prefer their team to be in the office, where they can collaborate, develop the organisational culture. This is a view especially common amongst middle-aged business owners.
“Others seem more relaxed about it and believe that some tasks can be performed remotely and indeed it may be quite efficient to do it that way.”
But maybe it doesn’t really matter what business owners think. Employees appear to have a lot of power at present – and employers can’t get the job done without them.
Some of the major insurers and brokers spelled out their WFH policies to insuranceNEWS.com.au:
IAG – We continue to offer flexible work options to our people. With our people distributed across various locations, we work dynamically with each team having its own rhythms and rituals to stay connected – whether it’s virtually or face-to-face. Depending on the role and each teams’ working patterns, we have options for onsite, offsite and hybrid.
Suncorp – Suncorp has been a leader in flexible working for many years, encouraging our people to make use of both home and office workspaces. We are continuing to seek the right balance that enables our customers to be best served, our culture to be maintained and our people to thrive and develop, embracing the advantages that working from home and working in the office provide. This generally involves our people working with their leader to determine the mix of work locations that best suits the needs of their customers, their team and their own situation.
Marsh – Marsh Pacific and its offices (across Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Papua New Guinea) operate under a hybrid work model. This means that our colleagues work a combination of in-person days in their headquarter office and remotely from home, based on their client and team needs and leadership agreement. The office will always be our hub for collaboration and connection, while embracing the opportunities enabled by a forward-thinking and collaborative approach to hybrid and WFH.
Aon – At Aon our commitment to our colleagues globally is to offer flexible work through our Smart Working model, supporting a resilient workforce of the future. The aim of Smart Working and Workstyles is to create a healthy, productive, inclusive and sustainable way of working, enabling colleagues to deliver their best work for clients from wherever they are best placed to do so. Colleagues, in consultation with their leaders, determine a Workstyle which enables them to work primarily at an office location, a hybrid approach working some days at an office, or work fully remotely.
