Ontario took a significant step on March 1 in the province’s journey through this pandemic, with the lifting of vaccine mandates and capacity limits. But, COVID-19 has changed the way we operate, whether we like it or not.
We are now two years into navigating the virus while adapting to circumstances we likely never imagined.
The most recent Statistics Canada study found just over 60 per cent of employees continued to go into work during the pandemic. Twenty-one per cent were entirely remote with the remaining 18 per cent splitting their time between home and the office.
Doron Melnick, who leads KPMG’s national team in change and consulting services, says many employees also gained hours to their day having avoided traffic on the roads. “The commute is a big difference for a lot of people in fact it’s one of the reasons people are reluctant to go back to the office,” said Melnick.
Researchers believe the pandemic has prompted a number of questions for employees going forward. Winny Shen is an Associate Professor of Organization Studies at York University’s Schulich School of Business and says there’s been a lot of resiliency with employees easily transitioning to a new way of work, but that’s not to say it hasn’t been stress-free. “Other people have really struggled with work from home like, how do you manage your work and family and work and life boundaries when all of a sudden when everything is happening in the same space,” said Shen.
While Shen says many people working remotely are looking forward to getting back into the office, others are still facing some anxieties and are looking for a new approach.
Melnick says 50 per cent of CEOs in their survey would be willing to offer a hybrid workplace. “As many as four out of five office workers would like to keep the ability to work from home some of the time and come to the office some of the time,” added Melnick.
City of Hamilton employees will start heading back in office later this month but Mayor Fred Eisenberger says it will be done gradually.
“Starting March 21, we are going to start bringing people back to the workplace. Probably about half are going to come back on a full-time basis and the other half may very well be in a hybrid situation,” said Eisenberger.
He added it’s a way to help the downtown economy. “Certainly having more people return to work both at city hall and other businesses downtown is going to make a huge difference for all of the businesses operating downtown, in the malls or in the restaurants. All those servicing the local community,” said Eisenberger.
The CEO of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business says the future of many small firms in downtown cores depends on a return of office workers.
