Hybrid Working: How To Protect Innovation

The pandemic has changed so many aspects of work and one of the biggest and most obvious is the space we inhabit. It has been so long since most of us were all together with our colleagues that it stands to reason that thing may not be the same on our return.

Some of the changes forced on us by the pandemic are not as new as many people or organisations think. Home working is not a new phenomenon and has been on the rise. In a study in 2015, over 12% of EU workers (3) and near one-quarter of U.S. employees (3) reported working from home. This showed that people’s work needs, and practices were already changing and the need for flexibility was on the rise pre-COVID-19.

One of the motivations cited for the desire to work from home was “the comfort of an alternative work environment” (3). This is an interesting concept, because it depends on people’s job roles and the tasks they need to complete.

Innovation Can’t Be Forced

Sir Isaac Newton worked in Cambridge University in 1665 but was forced to flee due to the outbreak of a previous pandemic, the Bubonic Plague. Newton worked in his countryside home for 18 months and it is said that he developed some of his greatest theories during this time. The COVID-19 pandemic has provided us with a unique opportunity to look at working from home in greater detail (3).

It’s difficult to imagine that Newton worried about his ability to think up new concepts and innovate because he couldn’t get into the office or talk to other likeminded people in person. To consider this fully, it is better to understand that there are different types and models of innovation for companies and that they thrive under different conditions (4).

In the Newton example, his innovations can be categorised as radical innovation, which is the type we are most familiar with. Calculus was not the first type of mathematics ever discovered, but it revolutionised the world in many ways. The same can be said of our understanding of gravity and optics.

But in more recent times, some Irish companies have been able to thrive during COVID-19 and did so from very early on, despite the “restrictions” placed on companies and their staff.

In an Irish Times article from April 2020, Ireland was “ranked in sixth in the global listing of countries that are responding best to the COVID-19 crisis” (5). Wonderful examples of our innovations can be seen in organisations like An Post, Medtronic, Irish Distillers and many, many more (6).

The point here is that innovation doesn’t have to be confined to boardrooms or face-to-face interactions in office space - individuals and organisations need to create new avenues of nurturing invention, innovation, and originality for the future.

Innovation And Office Space

Most of us are starting to think about what it will be like to be back in the office again, but many communal areas will not be available, social distancing will be in place and restrictions on the number of people back in the office will be here for some time to come. It's time to think of new ways to encourage innovation outside of the historical avenues.

In March 2021, an interesting article was published in Business Because (4) and this was the topic discussed. Costas Markides, professor of strategy and entrepreneurship at London Business School, said the following: “Innovation happens when people run into each other, not in planned meetings, but by chance.” This may have been true in the past, but what are we going to do if this is now not possible?

Mr Markides continues, “I often say the coffee machine is the best knowledge management tool you can conceive of,”. So, with this in mind, is post-COVID 19 the time to reinvent or discover the new “coffee machine” that will help to reignite or maintain the innovation cycle?

Some new examples or ideas are being trialled and finding the one that works for you personally and your organisation is key in your return-to-work strategy. There have been many different options put forward (1), though having multiple avenues in the beginning might be the best approach until they start to bear fruit.

If you can’t get up from your desk to meet someone for a coffee, then other possibilities can be explored like online coffee meetings, worker games night, in-house idea surveys and more. This also means, in a more physical sense, that the purpose of an office can now changes and so it should be geared towards the work activities that people are trying to achieve.

In the survey, Future of the Office (2), carried out by CBRE, it gives a better overview of how people's perception of the modern workspace area is changing.

It is particularly noticeable that collaboration and innovation remain high on people’s perceptions, while oversight of employees continues to rank the lowest. Therefore, office spaces need to do everything they can to ensure that this work role is prioritised when people are in the building together.

Conclusion

Creating the environment that you want in an organisation is difficult but worthwhile. Giving people the best chance of success, for all their work objectives needs to be factored in and understood. So, when planning to boost or maintain innovation, remember that this is not everyone's primary role, and it is not the only part of an innovator's work.

Pre-pandemic, in the office, people reported that they were better at sharing thoughts with colleagues, keeping in touch with their team, and collecting data. At home they have been better at working on their manuscripts, reading literature, and analysing their data (3).

So, even with restrictions in place, an organisation needs to nurture the work tasks best suited for the office and think about: