Related Posts
Bowl Leader
Who's won WFH bingo already?
More Posts
Need 11 likes to start DM please
Additional Posts in Advertising
Any word on Swift in Portland?
New to Fishbowl?
Download the Fishbowl app to
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
Rising Star
Some try-hards will ruin it for all of us by making it the only way to get ahead.
Yeah, as an SVP I’d be fine without more promotions.
What I’m not hearing in any of this thread (Or similar threads is a solid argument for moving back into the office that extends beyond cost. There are arguments. But they’re not too solid. What would we be moving back into? The open seating plan?
Most of it sounds familiar to the arguments/lies that were told about the open seating plan back when agencies shifted away from people working inside offices. It was all about “collaboration” and “working together as a team” when in fact, none of that was happening right up to last March.
Strictly from a creative department standpoint, any time a creative team actually needed to sit down and concept together, they had to vacate their picnic table and go find someplace where they could talk alone. A trusted space. Someplace where they could share bad ideas as well as good ideas and work them through with their trusted partner - away from all the unwanted ears. And, when you went back to your desk to actually execute those ideas you had to put on headphones or you got nothing done at all. (Or you just went back to wasting time. Looking busy.)
Working remotely with zoom and teams has eliminated all that nonsense.
Simply put, open seating did not increase creative output, it only lowered cost per employee.
From my vantage point, WFH has restored the creative process and lowered costs per employee even further than open seating.
+1
My guess is that most places will encourage some WFH, but after the first month it’ll get real messy with say 2/3rds of people in office, and 1/3 WFH. Meetings with 5 people in the room and 2 on screen will get old real damn fast. We’ll all be going back in.
The only reason it kind of works now is because we’re all doing it. And I say ‘kind of’ because everyone I know finds it waaaaaay more exhausting and has burn out.
Bring back the commute.
Bring back spontaneous walking into a coffee shop for a croissant.
Bring back actual chemistry with others.
Bring back impromptu learning from more experienced colleagues.
Bring back humanity.
Bring back my eyes not feeling like they’ve been punched with a pepper grinder every night.
Enjoying the commute is definitely not being said by those that sit in bumper to bumper traffic for an hour plus daily. Riding on a train where I could read a book or listen to my music for that time sounds much nicer. I don’t have kids but I like WFH, but would be ok with 1-2 days in the office.
I hope not. Wfh has been life changing to me and I cannot go back to commuting 5 days per week into NYC. 2-3 days wfh per week would be a perfect balance
Hopefully it will be optional. Agencies will save a ton if they keep everything WFH. The thought of going back to the pre pandemic routine just feels so weird and foreign
Yes, I think they’ll require people to return, for the most part.
I imagine a few places will become location optional, but I doubt it will be widespread.
I could see companies possibly being more open minded about working from home on a limited basis. Personally, I’d love to work from home once or twice a week.
I’m talking after everyone is vaccinated and the pandemic is over.
I predict that most of the big holding company agencies will slowly start encouraging people to come back as soon as it’s considered safe. Those who are still working remotely will inevitably feel pressure to come to the office and there will be a culture of this.
Ugh 622. Such an awful soulless space complete with nowhere to relax & eat ‘cept your desk + infuriating elevator algorithm. Give me my viewless shoebox anytime.
These companies have long term rent contracts for office space. They aren’t going to get out of their lease, or even be able to get a reduction. So be sure, that a return to the office is coming. The question will be if they will let you WFH a couple days/week. Sorry, I wish it wasn’t the case, but I do t see another way.
I think the holding companies will start to consolidate and shrink their footprints as leases roll to renewal. They'll have hubs where people can hot desk and teams/clients can meet up, but not everyone will have a desk. Omnicom has already done this a ton in my city.
Pre-pandemic, there was a reason agencies set up shop in a few specific cities—the talent pool was there. And it was beneficial for us as ad people to live in places we could jump around easily if things weren’t working or we felt ready for a promotion. I know I turned down opportunities at some of the few top shops in smaller markets because I was worried about taking a job I couldn’t easily leave.
Now, work from home is the new place to be. Enough good small agencies are going to be work from home that top talent that wants to seek out wfh opportunities will go there. Agencies that try to make employees come in will lose out on that top talent and need to allow wfh to compete. At least, I hope
I will never go back full-time. The commute to NYC is terrible. Even if my agency makes people, I would rather quit and find one that doesn’t. I think 2 days in 3 days out is ideal. I’d even deal with 3 in 2 out. But 5 again. NEVER.
Pro
5 days working in an ad agency is a bloody dream right now! People! Fun! Life!
There’s something else nobody is mentioning. There’s a symbolism to an office that the people in C-level jobs understand. Clients want the cool agency with the cool downtown office.
8 months from now, few CMOs are going to risk looking foolish of something fails by having picked the fully remote agency.
Think that’s dumb? Maybe it is. But most of you wouldn’t love it if your bank went fully remote, or if the government suddenly decided they didn’t need a White House and we’ll now get our press briefings from Joe’s den.
That being said, stop looking at it in such absolutes. I’m not sorry for everyone who loves WFH. Why? Because the world did make huge strides towards making that option more available moving forward. Just because it won’t happen at all businesses doesn’t mean your options haven’t been expanded significantly. You will surely be able to find more agencies that feel they can offer remote work. Be grateful things moved towards your life goals. 🙂
Cool space faded in the last decade. Almost all of my clients cut back on travel to NY because of the advances in video conferencing; even building large VC systems on their own sites. Even travel for research stopped. And in NYC, clients mostly demanded we go to them, as they didn’t want to spent the time coming to us. And, we had the best location, best office space and coolest vibe of any large agency. Maybe it was good for employees, but overall (the mean) clients couldn’t care less.
I think cost will be a driving factor for some. If agencies only need office space for half their workforce at any given time, they save a lot. My agency has been hiring like crazy the last year and I’ve noticed many of the new hires don’t live in NYC. So obviously those people will never return to the office. Makes me think they’ll continue to be ok with wfh.
100%. They also recently promoted a CD that left NYC and now lives in a non-commutable state (ie, now FT remote no matter what) to GCD, which makes me think they’ve embraced remote work completely. If you can advance at that level from afar, anything is possible. It won’t be just the in-office people moving up.
I think blended is what is going to be the new norm. It’s going to be at least a year or more until all people can and will want to return. Tech companies going remote-first will set the standard. Also, agencies are the most cost averse industry of all time. You think they haven’t already run the numbers on how much money they are saving by abandoning their expensive leases and feeding people and having coffee, snacks, and expensive lunches? They now know we will all work longer and we don’t even need to take breaks!
Based on cost effectiveness alone, I don’t think anyone is going to be back in an office full time for some time.
Especially in the urban hubs where real estate is so expensive. San Francisco is EMPTY and all these huge mega buildings will not fill up any time soon. Same with NY, Chicago etc.
I do miss the office and co-workers like crazy though. It’s just not the same.
We’ve been told once offices open, we‘ll have a 2 days WFH, 3 days in-office schedule. I’m hoping that will be flexible depending on your manager (I’d prefer to flip that), but who knows. With everyone needing to socially distance in an open office plan, I don’t see how the environment will be anything like it was before COVID. How will anyone feel comfortable using a communal kitchen or bathroom, or taking the same elevator as hundreds of others in the same huge office building?
Pro
I believe there will certainly come a time when the virus is all but eradicated, and we al feel safe again, even in the office. The question then becomes, why? Will people just accept the annoyances as they did when there was no choice?
Chief
I see companies joyfully saving money by leasing smaller offices and then trying to pull some major BS by claiming “you’re getting a lower salary b/c you’re working from home” (as if the location where you work matters).
Though they won’t have space for you to work at the office anyway.
They should pay WFHers more for shouldering their rent and internet!
That's a great question. We started an open-ended policy regarding working remotely or from home about a year prior to the pandemic. We went full force last year and plan to continue offering this policy for years to come along with some other fringe benefits. However, the team has already expressed their interest in coming into the office a least once per week to prevent feeling disconnected.
Good luck. I hope you're at a more progressive thinking agency.
It will absolutely return to normal. Clients prefer it, meaning agency leadership will prefer it. It may take a few months of playing the “be cool with the WFH crowd”, but as others have pointed out the people in the office will be the ones getting the promotions and the good work. If you’re hoping to stay WFH, you will be weeded out at some point. Sucks but such is the way of the industry we chose.
Have you read 1984? Update that to 2024 and replace the big screen with the big, med and little screen. There but for the grace of Buddha we go...
Can’t wait to go back in
I work at a small local shop and based on a recent convo with a higher-up, we will likely return to the office at 50% even after the pandemic is over.
There will likely be two groups and Group A goes in Mon, Wedn, and Fri one week and Tues and Thurs the next week, alternating with Group B.
I hope this is the case, because I’d rather spend an extra 30 mins working and being productive as opposed to sitting in traffic two hours a day.
We're in Florida and also staying away from making any predictions. WFH is great for all of the working parents we have.
I just don’t think that COVID is enough of a paradigm shift to change the populations of big cities. People will definitely come back to the office. Humans know no other way to work and the old people that run your companies are definitely more stuck in their ways then the younger employees that actually benefit from WFH. Sorry.
Old people, really?