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New Starbucks boss Brian Niccol caused many to spit out their coffee with the news he will commute around 1,000 miles from his home in California to the company’s HQ in Seattle. It’s true that he’ll have the luxury of the company jet for his trips to the office, which the coffee giant says will mean he’s meeting its policy of showing up for work in person at least three days a week.
But are the arguments about private jets and corporate lifestyles missing the point? We should really be asking whether any worker needs to be in the office three days a week if they can perform the role equally well from their home. Niccol will work flexibly, with a mixture of being in the office and working from home. Of course, many disagree strongly with this. Investment analyst Dan Coatsworth told the BBC that in his opinion a leader “needs to be at the heart of a business, not sitting on the beach”.
Other business leaders talking about home or remote working have used terms like “an aberration”, “lazy gits” and “morally wrong”“, while Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan said remote working doesn’t work for people who want to hustle.
This is “flexibility stigma” – the perception that employees working from home are somehow are less motivated or committed, and are less productive.
Unfortunately, this bias against flexible workers is common. In a recent representative survey of workers across Europe and the UK, about one in three respondents felt that flexible working was viewed negatively by managers or colleagues or that it damaged career outcomes.
Although we saw these views decline during the peak of the COVID pandemic when homeworking was enforced, they are coming back as more managers ask workers to return to the office, often citing problems with productivity or commitment as the main reasons.
But where do these ideas come from? There is growing evidence to suggest that remote workers are not only more committed and loyal to their job, they are generally more productive than their in-office counterparts.
In my book, The Flexibility Paradox, I show how flexible workers tend to work harder and longer than other workers. In fact, going back to the new Starbucks boss, he already has a track record of pulling another franchise, (Chipotle), out of crisis – and is likely to do the same for Starbucks, where sales have been down for a year or more.
Rather than evidence, these beliefs around remote workers come from something called facetime bias – when managers generally perceive those who they can see working as being committed and aligning with the notion of the ideal worker.
In many societies, including the UK and US, people believe that the ideal productive worker is someone who prioritises work, has no other responsibilities, and is working long hours (preferably in the office and always connected).
Remote working, especially when it is assumed that it is done for work-life balance, goes against this idea. As such, we presume the person is a slacker. This is why workers end up going into the office – not because it is more productive or because they want to, but because they are forced to or because they want to look like they are productive (even if they are not).
This stigma can leave remote workers suffering from negative career outcomes. It is the reason why flexible working can result in employees feeling the need to overwork or show “digital presenteeism” (spending too much time being visible online). It’s why flexible working sometimes results in worse work-life balance outcomes – with work encroaching on private lives rather than the other way around.
A new way forward
But here’s the good news. These views are not inevitable. My two papers published in the Journal of Family Research and forthcoming in Social Indicators Research (with Hyojin Seo, postdoctoral researcher at Tilburg University in the Netherlands) show how changing the way we think about work and gender roles, and providing better protection for workers, can tackle the biased views against flexible workers and ensure that it results in positive outcomes for their wellbeing.
These studies show how in countries with generous family policies, where a good work-life balance becomes the norm and is not seen as antithetical to productivity, and where it is expected that both men and women have caring responsibilities, people generally do not think flexible workers are slackers.
In other words, we need to tackle the old image of the “ideal worker”, which is based on factory-based modes of production where men were the breadwinners who could focus on putting in long hours at work, supported by women as full-time caregivers. We need to support the development of a new standard productive worker, where employees of all genders have responsibilities outside work. And we should change our work culture so that ample rest is seen as key to being productive, and providing care doesn’t mean you are less of a worker, but rather can make you a better one.
In fact, unlike Niccol, the boss of Santander UK Mike Regnier was upfront about taking up the job was because he could work from home a few days a week. Regnier said it doesn’t mean he is less productive and, from what I can see, he seems to be right.
Niccol, if he can show he is a great manager even when working more days in California, could not only fight off these sceptics but also ensure that others enjoy the same benefits as he does.
Who cares if you’re sitting at a beach, and not in rainy Seattle away from family, as long as you get the job done? As a bonus, with more home working and fewer three-hour commuting flights, he might help Starbucks meet its emission targets.
Heejung Chung has previously and is currently working for the European Commission on the project exploring different policy options for their Right To Disconnect directive. She also has funding from the Norwegian Research Council, the Productivity Institute/ESRC, and the European Commission Horizon 2020 initiative (TransEuroWorks) on issues around remote working, bias against remote workers, with an aim on finding policy solutions to challenges coming from the rise of digitalisation of work and remote working. She has also worked with the UK Trades Union Congress on exploring the experiences of Black and Minority Ethnic Workers working from home. She has previous received funding from the ESRC on working time flexibility and work life balance. She is also currently an advisor for the Working Families, and the European Foundation.
