The RTO Debate: Why Creative Freedom Can Surpass Rigid Office Policies

At the moment it seems that all you have to do is talk about remote work and the topic triggers a whole range of feelings.

The problem is, like many debates these days, the arguments on all sides are often shockingly nuanced.

The simple truth about remote work is that it works well for some people and certain types of work, but not so well for other people and tasks.

Even the most ardent Return to Office (RTO) advocates recognize that working in the office is not a universally ideal solution.

They may not admit it outright, but with a little research you can find the clues.

For example, as we all learned when Amazon’s CEO recently announced a return to pre-pandemic office policies, this is one of the more rigorous approaches. The call was for a full office work pattern of five days a week.

The gist of the CEO’s memo was that physical proximity fosters a stronger company culture and improves collaboration, and that face-to-face interactions make it easier for employees to learn from each other, maintain stronger team connections, drive innovation, and brainstorm.

Check out Amazon in detail

Leaving aside whether that’s true, I’d like to highlight three sentences from his memo in which he lays out some reasonable exceptions:

“Before the pandemic, not everyone was in the office five days a week, every week. If you or your child were sick, if you had an emergency at home, if you were traveling to visit clients or partners, if you needed a day or two to finish coding in a more isolated environment, they worked People from far away. This has been understood and will continue to be taken forward in the future.”

Can you guess which part of this quote caught my attention?

It’s about the part “If you needed a day or two to complete programming in a more isolated environment…”

Anyone who has ever done creative work or high concentration work (thinking, writing, analyzing, etc.) knows full well that you can get more work done in an hour in a quiet, uninterrupted place than in six hours in the office.

And for managers: If your goal is to get the best work possible from your team, it’s in your best interest to give them a little flexibility to find the best environment in which to get their work done.

Adopt fewer “guidelines.”

One aspect of leadership style is mentioned Directivity.

Directivity refers to how much control or authority someone exercises in leading others.

A person high in directivity tends to give clear, specific instructions, make decisions for others, and closely control how tasks are completed.

Someone with low command will be more reserved, allowing employees to make their own decisions and allowing people to work independently without needing supervision or specific guidance.

As you can imagine, the current environment tends to favor leaders who are less directive.

In fact, data was obtained from the “What is your leadership style?” test. shows that the most preferred leadership type is a Idealist.

This is someone with low directivity who takes a more democratic and open-ended approach to leadership.

Rather than giving detailed instructions or tightly controlling decisions, these leaders encourage creativity, personal expression and learning by doing.

They do not impose strict processes or structures, but instead promote an environment where everyone has an equal voice and the freedom to try out ideas.

Of course, low directivity is not appropriate in every situation.

Sometimes there needs to be a tightly controlled environment.

However, even Amazon’s CEO hints at the idea that if we want to do great work, we may need to give people the freedom to find the best path for themselves.

So before your company follows Amazon’s lead and adopts the blanket RTO policy, think about whether this is really the best way to get the best work from your people.