Yesterday marked the beginning of summer; and for some states the beginning of the next phase of their COVID-19 reopening implementation. As businesses start to mull over or roll out their return-to-work plans, I couldn’t help but wonder, should we be returning to work? I don’t mean to get into some political debate over whether it’s safe or not to return to work. What I do mean to suggest is, could this be the start of the cultural shift millennials have been waiting for instead?

A “Gallup [poll] consistently has found that flexible scheduling and work-from-home opportunities play a major role in an employee’s decision to take or leave a job.¹” While today’s circumstances are certainly a bit different as many of us navigate working from home along with caring for children or elderly parents, the same desire to work-from-home has likely not gone away. In fact, this taste of a new reality might have even strengthened this resolve among millennials. From firsthand experience, I can tell you this isn’t to be taken lightly if you want to retain parts of your workforce.

I once left a job I loved because there was no upward mobility scenario where I could partake in remote work, beyond moving to a sales role. I knew my growing family would eventually want to leave the area because neither my husband nor I were from there, so I left. At another time, I left a position because it did not offer the flexibility I needed. It wasn’t their fault; during the interview they told me there would be limited flexibility and I thought I could make it work, but I found out that inflexibility just wasn’t for me. I wanted to be able to make doctor’s appointments for my son during the day and work from home the rest; to make soccer practices that started before a 5pm shutdown. And so, I left.

I have always been a hard worker, and I don’t think anyone would have ever questioned my work ethic or the ability to still get things done. But it was instead, just a part of the old policies in place and trying to make a “one size fits all” approach in the workplace.

While many of your plant workers have been on the front lines during the pandemic, it’s now time to think about the possibility of returning your employees in marketing, IT, finance, R&D and/or HR to the office. In recent weeks, progressive workplace companies like Twitter and Microsoft have said that their employees can work remote either indefinitely or through the end of the year. While the meat industry tends to be on the slower end of things, I hope this time we are not. You need to retain that younger workforce, with their fresh ideas and new approaches to the old ways of doing things. I hope instead that we look at what went well with remote workers during this pandemic and look to update our policies to ones more in line with the expectations of the current workforce. Gen Z will likely follow close behind millennials in wanting flexibility and remote work options. With such “progressive” policies, you might even be able to recruit and attract some new talent to the meat industry. Just keep in mind that the current reality might have given those individuals on the fence about remote work a push over, and there might not be any “return to normal” for them.

References: ¹https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/15/us/remote-workers-work-from-home.html

Remote work

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