Craig Roth

Well, this whole virtual collaboration thing, working from anywhere at anytime, was a nice try but now I guess it’s over.  So says Lucy Kellaway in the Economist’s “Year in 2012” issue (Back to Formality).  I’d best transition my industry analysis coverage area (collaboration, communication) to dry cleaning of wool suits, corporate real estate trends, and maybe start a magic quadrant on landline desk phones.

I’d like to know what others think of this prediction, but, appropriately, there seems to be no way to comment on this article.  Presumably this is because you should be commenting on it around the water cooler, not with the dinosaurs still working at Starbucks.

First, here’s what Ms. Kellaway predicts for this year:

In 2012 the following will be back in fashion: the landline, the jacket, the commute, the handshake and above all the office itself.  Out of fashion will be the virtual office in which employees sit hunched over laptops in their local Starbucks, joined to their colleagues by webcam and e-mail. Instead, working life will start to resemble its old self before the internet was invented. Employees will turn up to work at predictable hours five days a week, and will comport themselves with greater formality than before. Face-to-face meetings will be preferred to video conferences; ideas will be exchanged not by tweet, but by the coffee machine.

And as for the power of social software to help connect new workers to others that know the tricks of the trade or where information is, forget it.  You’re stuck with whoever is physically within 100 yards of you:

Managers will start to realise that remote working has been disastrous for spreading corporate culture, and that in particular it has made it difficult for younger workers to pick up the tricks of the trade. With no one to copy, they have failed to adjust well to the world of work. The new formality will suit the young: they will turn up to work smartly dressed and have no option but to immerse themselves in the corporate culture and learn from those above them in the pecking order.

OK, I’ll admit my bias upfront.  My team and I cover all the technologies Ms. Kellaway derides (web conferencing, e-mail, microblogging, social networking) as well as the new ways of working they enable.  It’s actually refreshing to see someone arguing for the status quo.  Her bio says she “pokes fun at management fads and jargon.”  But I strongly doubt we’ll look back on the first decade of the 21st century and say “remember that fad where workers thought they could collaborate virtually and everyone was sending emails?”  I have worked virtually for 14 years now at three different companies and while there are disadvantages, the advantages have won out.  I voluntarily go into the office about once a week for various reasons, which seems to fit my ideal blend of old style and the virtual style of working.

One has to remember the drivers that made these technologies essential to the corporate tool belt.  To say they are fads means also believing these drivers were fads:

• Globalization: The odds of everyone you need to be successful being present in the same office are increasingly remote.  And I’ll also lump flexibility and outsourcing in the supply chain into this category as well.  Good luck getting everyone you need in the same place, five days a week, from 9-5.
• Increased organizational agility: The need to respond quickly to events.  While the status quo allowed quick creation of physical war rooms, it’s far more common to need to gather intelligence, ideas, and buy-in from a distributed virtual workgroup at all hours of the day.
• Broader talent pooling: I hire research analysts and I am quite happy to be able to draw from a nationwide (or worldwide) talent pool since we work virtually rather than the best analyst I can find within 30 miles of my location (no offense to one of my analysts who, coincidentally, does live within 30 miles of me!).  For generalized jobs it may not matter, but a corollary to this driver is increased job specialization.
• Work/life flexibility: The jury is out on whether anytime/anywhere mobile access helps the worklife balance or hinders it.  But there is no doubt this technology has introduced flexibility that wasn’t possible back when I had to babysit 2am production releases in the office (loneliness is having to wave your arms around every 10 minutes so the lights don’t turn off on you). 

As for culture, I’m not sure the degree to which 1970’s office culture or social-technology-enabled Gen Y culture will win out, but it will be some blend of the two.  There are certain people who make a good impression when leading, arguing, persuading, or connecting in person, and there are others who are more persuasive using virtual technologies.  It’s nice to give the virtually persuasive folks a louder voice and I think the diversity of views and approaches is paying off. 

If there’s a sudden resurgence of office workers voluntarily dressing in suits and ignoring virtual teammates then I’d predict that to be a short term fad, not the other way around.

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