RETAIL BANKING: BACK-TO-OFFICE ISSUES
Offices services firm IWG expects an increase in demand for office spaces outside of Singapore’s Central Business District (CBD).
Why the hybrid work model is here to stay Banks stand to lose not just on cost savings, but also in the fierce war for talent, if they stubbornly push for the return of pre-pandemic work set-ups in the new normal.
B
anks could no longer kid themselves that having all their staff work from an office is the right work set-up moving forward. Whilst offices will always be a mainstay of the working life, the pandemic has proven that working remotely does not necessarily hit employees’ productivity—and it would be more damaging for leaders to insist otherwise. “Office life, along with the “old” ways of working and workplace setting, has not completely changed, but will also never return to the way it was pre-COVID-19,” said Paul MacAndrew, country manager for office services company IWG in Singapore and Hong Kong. “Instead, at IWG, we believe that the future of (professional) work is the hybrid office.” The pandemic has helped shift the way all companies, including banks, see working and office use, MacAndrew told Asian Banking & Finance in an interview. Not only did it spark a revolution in the work-from-home (WFH) initiative, it also brought about a radical change in employee behaviour and mindsets – a trend that will have a long-lasting and profound impact in the way we work from now onwards, even after the pandemic situation is over, he noted. But some banking leaders remained tethered to the pre-pandemic way of working. JP Morgan CEO Jamie Damon had been widely reported to harbour a form of
6 ASIAN BANKING AND FINANCE | Q3 2021
After over a year of working from home, many staff see a mandated return to the office as less desirable
antagonism against work from home, commenting in a media-sponsored conference in May that “it doesn’t work for those who want to hustle. It doesn’t work for spontaneous idea generation. It doesn’t work for culture.” He’s not alone in this regard. During a conference in February, Goldman Sachs chief David Solomon called the work from home an “aberration,” treating it as though it’s a mistake to be corrected, and insisting that it is not the new normal. Like Damon, Solomon said that work from home is against the investment banking giant’s culture. In North America, 80% of 400 banking leaders said that they want employees to remain working in the office 4-5 days a week, according to a survey by Accenture. They reportedly claim that remote working is “hurting company culture” and is making it harder to train new hires. The problem is, the vast majority of the workforce or those who belong in the middle—employees who are neither senior executives in their offices, or newbies yearning for more guidance to learn the tools of the trade—want to stay working at home, according to professional services firm Accenture. Staff could not really be blamed if they prefer a hybrid set-up: it means being able to better balance work-life priorities, have greater control over their daily schedules, and cut down on commuting time and related employment expenses, MacAndrew said.
