Return-to-office rebellion sparks wild office behavior

Daily Mail​

4 days ago

Published: | Updated:
As employers push harder for in-person work, employees are finding new ways to resist — without outright refusing to show up. Short of simply refusing to turn up office workers are finding new creative solutions to limit their in-person hours. The most popular trend du jour, driven largely by millennials, is 'coffee badging'.
It involves showing up at the office just long enough to grab a coffee, greet the right people, and then quietly leave to finish the day working remotely. The behavior is now so widespread that executives are seeing it as a threat to their efforts to return workforces to the office. Three-quarters of companies say they are struggling with employees coffee badging, a recent report found.
At Samsung, the practice got so out of hand that its US semiconductor division has rolled out a return-to-office monitoring tool, Business Insider reported earlier this week. The 'compliance tool' makes sure staff are turning up as often as expected by their bosses and also prevents 'lunch/coffee badging,' the company wrote in a memo to employees.
Amazon has also cracked down, having one-on-one conversations with repeat offenders, Fortune reported. Now that it's been more than a year, we're starting to speak directly with employees who haven't regularly been spending meaningful amounts of time in the office to ensure they understand the importance of spending quality time with their colleagues,' a spokesperson from Amazon told the publication. Elsewhere 44 percent of hybrid workers admitted to coffee badging, according to a survey conducted by Owl Labs.
According to Bezinga millennials are the demographic most likely to be trying to stretch the limits of hybrid work policies. Gen Z meanwhile are actually more keen to return to the office after starting their careers remotely during the pandemic. Young workers attend the office 3.1 days a week, compared to older age groups who show up between 2.5 and 2.7 days a week, a survey by property group JLL found.
Prominent voices such as JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon (pictured) have warned that homeworking is holding younger workers back . 'The young generation is being damaged by this,' he said in a leaked recording of a private meeting. 'They're being left behind socially, in sharing ideas, and meeting people.' Company wide mandates for minimum office attendance are becoming more common.
Recently Google announced that many workers who had previously been cleared for home working would now have to attend the office for a minimum of three days a week. If staff do not comply they will face losing their jobs, the company said in April.
TD Bank also demanded its workers return to their corporate offices at least four days a week by early November. Melanie Burns, the bank's head of HR, told employees that working in person will boost collaboration and decision making. Burns also said coming into the office could improve individuals career prospects.