'Peeling back the lid' on hybrid working

17 Dec 2024

Despite hybrid working becoming the new norm for so many over the past four years, how often have we had the opportunity to reflect on the ways it has impacted daily life? As part of a recent Children in Scotland webinar, our Head of Services, Billy Anderson, invited other individuals working in the children’s sector to join him in exploring hybrid working and whether it was really working for them. Here, Billy shares some interesting observations from the session.

I always found that when talking to individual people about their journey through the pandemic to where we are now, everyone had a different story to tell with, what I have termed as, similar positives, frustrations, barriers, worries and wins. I didn’t think that we, as a sector, have had the chance to talk about all of this in a collective way so I set about creating the session by telling my own story.

When I opened up the blank PowerPoint presentation, I felt that my story had to start right at the beginning. For my own reflections it was necessary to remember what working life was like in the sector when I joined almost 25 years ago. This was a time when the office I worked in had one computer to share between eight of us and case notes were mostly handwritten. However, around that time technology was becoming more prominent as organisations were investing in new buildings with new I.T infrastructures where the move to going ‘paperless’ was felt like a real 21^st century advancement.

Throughout my reflections on my early years in the sector, it was astounding how much driving and travelling was involved on a weekly basis. Travelling almost 100 miles to get to work, driving 50% of the day once at work, and then travelling home. There was a distinct split between home and work. I was also with people in offices, meeting rooms, homes, schools, police stations, hospitals, sports centres, forests, fields, zoos, stadiums, cars and colleges.

It wasn’t really until I started writing out my story that when it came to 2020 - with the news of COVID-19 burbling away in the background in some far away land - that I realised what a jolt my life had taken. It was a surreal jolt. An acceleration of technology and new working protocols coupled with a deceleration of life itself. The psychologically imposed G-force of this simultaneous acceleration and deceleration created a destabilisation of reality that I don’t feel we have fully come to terms with. Even the process of reflecting back on all of this stuff was quite an emotional experience as it had, to some degree, been locked up and placed on a shelf in my mind with a do not disturb label hurriedly slapped on its lid.

Removing these experiences from the shelf and peeling back the lid on it was kind of my aim. To look back on things from the position that we find ourselves in now and engage others in discussion about how they feel now, what’s working and not working and try to get a grip on whether or not we are still largely in a place of destabilisation.

Finding a balance

So, with my story told to the participants in the session, it was now a space for sharing stories and finding out about those positives, frustrations, barriers, worries and wins. On the positives side of things, flexibility came out on top. This was flexibility in a variety of ways from managing workload, to introducing hybrid working options for staff. “We wanted a set pattern. Our full-time staff have a minimum of two days in the office and our part time staff have a minimum of one”, shared one participant. It was interesting to learn from this participant that those office days were, where possible, focused on being together with each other and staff were encouraged to not set any meetings during that time.

The creation of a good work-life balance was high on the agenda where that separation between the two appeared to be a common frustration/worry for participants. As one person said, “I can shut my laptop at five o’clock and be in the kitchen at five past making the tea and still thinking about work.” For all of the positives that the rise of technology has brought, it was felt to be a frustration too in terms of how our work has seeped into our homes and home life, an individual reflecting, “I now have access to emails 24/7. I need to be really self-disciplined to switch off notifications when on leave because the temptation to check them is always there.”

There was also what was described as a ‘tension’ between people who worked predominantly from home and those who worked predominantly from an office or base/in the field. There was a felt pressure to “justify that you are actually working”. From what was described as an increase in trust and flexibility over managing workload from home, it appears that some mistrust (or perceived) has slipped in again. “Why do I feel the need to ask others to check my calendar to prove that I’m working? I know that I am working hard but still feel the need to prove it”, noted a participant. This has potentially led to feelings of guilt where home workers are always available and fill their calendars with appointments and back-to-back meetings. In turn, workloads have felt significantly higher and more pressurised since hybrid working began which impacts on the value of contracts where doing more with less is the prevailing narrative.

The positives of the accelerated use of technology were also prominent. Described by one participant as “the turnkey that unlocked a new culture”, this very sharp and quick change has allowed us to reduce costs and do some previously expensive and logistically impossible work in the virtual arena. There was a feeling within the group that we can’t go back now noting that, "young people are comfortable within the virtual world so it is very much a case of what’s next and what’s best”.

The value of a virtual meeting place

There were also reflections on engagement with children and young people virtually where the anxiety inducing spectre of a ‘professional’ coming to see you at your own home could be nullified. The rituals and routines of this where you arrange a home visit, you knock at the door, you go in and talk with a parent or carer over a cup of tea and a biscuit and then you talk to the child. In a virtual space you can get direct access to a child where, for some, this allowed communication on a more relaxed and impersonal level that really worked for them. We seriously need to think who a home visit is benefitting. Is it a staff member’s preference at the expense of the child’s experience?

The same principle applies to the workforce who are made up of a range of personality types largely located within the two distinct camps of introverted and extroverted. Home working has been a blessing for some especially where childcare is involved. However, the working from home element with all of its flexibility and methods of communication to cater for all personality types needs some reflection and scrutiny from a wellbeing perspective when people all come together at events or large-scale meetings. We don’t inhabit those spaces as frequently now and I for one, can find the experience draining. Even though these experiences can be draining there is definite benefits and a need to be with other people.

Connections at the virtual 'watercooler'

‘Watercooler’ chat was mentioned alongside building and developing relationships with others as something that needs to be worked at and created now. From minimum working days in office, to quarterly all staff in-person meetings, there were various iterations of the importance of being together, seeing each other in three dimensions - we observed how we quite often work with people over long periods of time on a screen without having met each other in the physical world. Using Microsoft Teams channels to open up more informal watercooler style spaces was discussed where having a laugh with colleagues was encouraged. In these less formal spaces, it also brings about opportunity to share and discuss wellbeing topics in a natural way. There was a concern, however, that relationship building using this mode of communication “is almost verging on being overly friendly for a workspace”.

Hybrid working - an ongoing journey

During the session we looked at the ‘Fisher Personal Transition Curve’ and posed the question of where we thought we all were in terms of our own journey. There was a general feeling that we were on the ‘Gradual acceptance’ of the upside of the curve…but we’d not quite got it right yet. The curve tool itself is a helpful way of plotting yourself across recent years and understanding the behaviours and choices of others too. We also briefly discussed how we feel that we are best supported by looking at a person-centred thinking tool, ‘The one-page profile’. People found this question quite hard to answer and for me this was symptomatic of how much time we spend on supporting others and not on thinking about our own needs. As one participant said, “We are always thinking of others. This can add to the guilt of working from home and feeling the need to justify it. We are all role models for each other…we need trust in each other.”

How much we share our support needs with our supervisors came up in discussion where it was found to be quite difficult to “go there”. This has potentially led to greater use of external ‘mentors’ in similar roles or positions where some of the complexities of working life can be talked about in a more open and honest way without fear of any supervisory power dynamics coming into play. Building internal and external relationships was discussed as being an altogether different concept and task in the hybrid working world.

So, anyway, I felt that the session kind of did what I was hoping in that we shared stories and experiences in an open and honest way. I hope that people will continue to have these conversations and continue to reflect on how things are working for them. More importantly, people can spend some time reflecting on how they are and who they are in the hybrid world and consider how they are best supported. I want to extend my thanks to the participants on the day for their time and their reflections as we continue our journeys along our individualised transition curves. I’ll put my thoughts back up on their shelf for now, but think I’ll leave the lock off and bin the do not disturb sticker.