21-05-2025
5 things in the office you can't duplicate with work from home
Working from home, whether in a remote or hybrid job, has its benefits — but there are some things that can't be replicated compared to working in an office.
That's something many workers are missing out on these days. Across 74 promising early-stage startups in the mid-Atlantic, there were more than four times as many remote jobs as in-person jobs, according to a analysis. And there were even more hybrid jobs where employees work from home some or most of the time.
It's not just startup employees. A 2024 MyPerfectResume survey found that just 2% of more than 4,000 employees preferred to work on-site full-time since the COVID pandemic gave office workers a taste of work-from-home. Larger companies that continue to hire all-remote workers include Verizon, NBCUniversal and HubSpot. In 2022, Comcast sold a nearly state-of-the-art customer service center after seeing its employees work just as well from home.
Still, with the federal government sending hundreds of thousands of remote workers back to sometimes non-existent offices after an executive ban on remote work, the age of working from home might be dimming. And while for many companies and employees, there is no one-size-fits-all workplace type, most jobs require at least some time in the office.
Work-from-home defenders may be quick to say that there are no disadvantages to fully remote work (and for some jobs, that may be true), but experts say there are some things that can't simply be duplicated. Here are five of them.
Spontaneous collaboration
Yes, in a healthy remote work scenario, colleagues can communicate online throughout the day and jump on a call if necessary, but being around colleagues in person fosters more opportunities for collaboration that don't fall into a scheduled virtual meeting.
'As much as becoming untethered from the workplace by cell phone, by virtual meetings, is an advantage,' said Paul Levy, then-president of Center City District in Philadelphia in a 2023 interview, 'there are huge advantages for face-to-face interaction in brainstorming and developing new ideas.'
Mentorship
Mentorship experiences are some of the most impactful experiences a person can have in their career. It's not impossible to do virtually, but, like collaboration, spending mentor time face-to-face is valuable.
'You get a good amount more social nourishment from being with your peers and colleagues at work,' Ballard Spahr partner Kimberly Klayman said during a panel about burnout and remote work at the 2023 Builders conference.
Klayman found that training junior associates at the firm in person, along with partners, reduced the burnout rate.
Device repair
When an employee's computer crashes or gets a virus, it's a lot easier to handle if IT assistance is right there.
'Aside from salary, employees rank access to technology tools and support to effectively do their jobs as the most influential factor in deciding whether to stay or leave an employer,' said Alan Shen, VP of solution management and digital workplace solutions at Unisys in a 2023 guest post.
In-office amenities
A wealth of in-office amenities, like daily free meals, a gym, recreation and relaxation perks can be a red flag signaling that your employer expects you to spend a lot of time at the office. At the same time, who doesn't like a free bagel in the morning here and a pickup cornhole game there? Little perks can be one of the fun parts of going into the office that can be hard to duplicate remotely.
Most of the over-the-top amenities like free laundry service went away after the height of the pandemic, and the trend went toward perks like flexibility, paid time off and mental health support.
Still, if you have to return to the office, a few in-person perks don't hurt.
Work-life separation
One of the biggest things remote work offers for employees who have spent years commuting to 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. jobs is a better work-life balance. When a parent with a 45-minute daily commute might see their school-aged children just an hour or two a day before bed, it's no wonder that remote work is so popular.
But, for some people, being at home all the time is too much — and too much of anything can lead to burnout. As many people learned during the pandemic lockdowns, spending hours working virtually can also lead to Zoom fatigue.
For hybrid employees, time in the office should be unlike working from home, focusing on collaboration and other in-person things.
'If you just need to code, the best place usually is in your house,' said Anil Karmel, cofounder and CEO of RegScale, in 2023. 'You've got your setup, you're comfortable, you've got whatever you need to do that deep work. [In contrast,] collaborative work is like, 'I'm running into a roadblock, we need to come into the office, sit with the architects and the managers and CTO and lay out that strategy.''
