A growing number of British workers are ignoring work-from-home advice and flooding back to the office during the January lockdown, according to research, as people increasingly find remote working “untenable” in the long term.
More than twice as many office staff are leaving the house to go into work this winter than in the initial months of coronavirus restrictions last year, according to data from footfall monitoring company Metrikus.
Last spring, an average of just 8% of office-based staff were making the commute, but that figure has jumped to around 18% this month. Michael Grant, Metrikus’ chief operations officer, said the figures indicated “the strength of ties to the office”.
“Nine months into restrictions in the UK, office occupation is double what it was during the first lockdown, which suggests that a significant number of people find working from home untenable in the long term,” he said.
It comes despite prime minister Boris Johnson locking the country down again over the winter months amid soaring coronavirus cases, directing people to work from home wherever possible.
Jonny Rosenblatt, co-founder of flexible office firm Spacemade, told EG that he too had seen “a massive uptick” in people going into the company’s spaces.
At one central London site, he said the company had recorded a roughly 16-fold increase in the number of people using the facility between the first lockdown and this one, with the space operating at around one-fifth of its capacity in January.
“Whether it is kids, flatmates or just the need to be in proximity to others, increasing numbers of people need to be somewhere that they can dedicate their time and energy to working,” he said.
Last year, bosses at the likes of JP Morgan, Schroders and Twitter hailed homeworking during lockdown as a success, and several suggested that large swathes, or even all, of their workforce could adopt it permanently.
But a growing number of experts are now predicting a hybrid model of working as a more likely outcome in the long term.
Tomáš Jurdák, head of real estate at investor MiddleCap, said: “Our homes are ill-equipped for long-term working from home, not least because it will become very isolating.
“The office is, and always will be, more than just desk space. It adds huge social value by bringing colleagues together to connect, collaborate and create.”
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