Stock photo: Microsoft office

Americans appear to have adapted to remote work exceptionally well during the Covid-19 pandemic. A recent national survey from Chubb found not only that productivity was up among those working from home, but also that nearly three-quarters of workers want to continue working remotely more frequently than they did before the shutdowns began.

These statistics don't mean there weren't speed bumps along the way, and study after study has looked at how to mitigate issues that have arisen as a result of the move to remote work. One company—Microsoft—decided to take a deep dive into how its employees were handling the myriad changes related to working from home, the results of which they shared with the Harvard Business Review in its seven-part series "The New Reality of WFH."

Natalie Singer-Velush, Kevin Sherman, and Erik Anderson write about launching "an experiment to measure how the work patterns across our group were changing, using Workplace Analytics, which measures everyday work in Microsoft 365, and anonymous sentiment surveys. We didn't know what we'd find, but we felt certain that it would help us, our partners, our customers, and other organizations navigate the phases of this shift."

So what did they find? First and foremost: The 30-minute meeting.

The authors write that the transition to shorter meetings happened organically, without a mandate from above, and the change was welcomed. Suddenly they found themselves asking questions about the previously accepted concept of the hour-long meeting: "Does it really need to be that long? Is this a wise use of everyone's time?"

Speaking of meetings, another discovery was the benefit of increased frequency of one-on-ones between managers and employees. Research found that employees averaging the most weekly one-on-one time with their managers experienced the smallest increase in working hours. "In short, managers were buffering employees against the negative aspects of the change by helping them prioritize and protect their time," the researchers write.

Manager workloads also increased significantly during the shift to working from home. The authors learned that, in March, senior managers spent more than eight hours a week collaborating, and sent 115 percent more instant messages, in working to support employees and manage dispersed teams.

Another key finding concerns flexibility: Teams shifted meetings from an 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. window toward a 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. window. Research also revealed a new "night shift" forming, when employees would catch up on both individual and team work. Collaboration increased on weekends, as well. This reveals, the authors write, "a shift in our work culture that was neither intended nor wanted."

More welcome, perhaps, is the growing trend of virtual social meetings in order to stay connected during this time of separation. From group lunches to "meet my pet" happy hours, social meetings increased by 10 percent in a month. Scheduled one-on-one meetings between employees went up by 18 percent. Another surprise: Employees not only maintained their existing networks but extended them to include other teams, increasing their connections.

As crucial as this research has been for Microsoft, the "trickier and equally critical" next step will be to decide which changes to address. The researchers believe that "now is a perfect time to carefully and deliberately reshape our work culture."

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Richard Binder

Richard Binder, based in New York, is part of the social media team at ALM. He is also a 2014 recipient of the ASPBE Award for Excellence in the Humorous/Fun Department.