Since June 24, according to the new version of the national deconfinement protocol for companies published by the Ministry of Labor, telecommuting is no longer the norm. Even if it remains possible in certain cases.

And yet, we re not done talking about telecommuting! It s definitely the little revolution brought about by confinement, which will have had the benefit of significantly accelerating digitalization in companies... Or, failing that, of pushing HR departments to seriously look into the matter.

For it is certain that, in the coming months, this issue will become an integral part of the landscape for all employees. It s THE post-Covid HR issue, and numerous studies and surveys have been published on the subject over the past month.

This is an opportunity to draw up a complete and reliable barometer of the feelings of employees on the one hand, and HR departments on the other, on the eve of starting discussions between social partners to review working patterns.

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Telecommuting very much in favor

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By 2019, 30% of employees had worked from home, 47% of them for less than a day. But that was before!

In the wake of the crisis, the cards have been completely reshuffled. On the Human Resources side, 85% of HR managers want to develop and perpetuate teleworking. 93% of them think it will revolutionize their company s management practices, while 2 out of 3 believe it will boost productivity.

As far as employees are concerned, the picture is exactly the same! In fact, 85% of them want to continue the teleworking experience. For 68% of them, telecommuting offers a better work-life balance.

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Quality of life at work and a new life!

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Of course, we already know that telecommuting saves long commutes. That it makes day-to-day life easier when it s time to take the youngest to soccer practice. That it allows you to deal with unforeseen circumstances, such as waiting for a washing machine to be delivered.

But that s not all. The findings go much further. After confinement, employees are beginning to dream of a different way of working... a different way of living.

A Cadremploi survey in June 2020 showed that 90% of executives, the segment of the population surveyed, would be prepared to move away from their place of work if their company allowed them to work remotely several days a week. Nearly 70% would also prefer to telework 3 or 4 days a week.

Where confinement has had a strong impact on mentalities is that almost one executive in two has begun to think about where they live. They are looking for a bigger home (53%), with an outside (58%) and to improve their quality of life (84%).

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Companies that have already taken the plunge...

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And some companies have already taken these demands very seriously.

PSA, the most high-profile example, announced in its "New Era of Agility" plan that 80,000 of its 200,000 employees worldwide would be teleworking, at a rate of 3.5 to 4 days a week.

And beyond the question of Quality of Life at work for the employee, the benefit of this approach where telecommuting becomes the norm is that... The savings on corporate real estate costs will be substantial! Less face-to-face work means less need for workspace, and therefore the possibility of renting smaller, less expensive premises. And in these times of major economic crisis, cutting costs is a major challenge.

For the Live Mentor start-up, too, the end of confinement was not synonymous with a return to the corporate world. In fact, they simply handed back the keys to their now useless premises, with the aim of being able to work literally... wherever they wanted. Start-up Wizi, for example, gave up its premises to save nearly €40,000 a year.

Not to mention the fact that for companies, which have sometimes invested in equipping their employees with the means to work remotely, it s important to make the money back...

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The question of RPS

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But in the land of telecommuting, all is not rosy, far from it. There are also those employees who are uncomfortable with digital tools, who don t have good working conditions at home, or who no longer know how to make sense of a job that is done remotely.

Let s put the facts in context. By March 2020, 41% of employees will be 100% teleworking (full remote). But for 40% of them, this is something new. The changes have been brutal, with no forethought and without the guidance that would have been necessary.

And the result is that two months later, according to the May 2020 Empreinte Humaine &Opinion Way barometer, 42.5% of them consider themselves to be in psychological distress. In fact, 17% consider themselves to be in a high level of psychological distress.

And for good reason: lack of preparation means lack of framework, and for 53% of employees surveyed, the absence of rules hinders their practice of remote working.

39% of them also underline their feeling of isolation, and 60% their fear of "e-meetings" amplified during confinement. For them, these points are sources of psychological suffering.

We mentioned above the example of PSA, which wants to move to a telecommuting standard, but this has not entirely convinced employees. According to a CFDT survey of 3,300 PSA employees, 72% of them do not want to work remotely for more than 3 days a week.

So there are still obstacles to the widespread use of telecommuting in companies, which must take into account the situations of individual profiles, lacking skills or a living environment conducive to working remotely. The question of the watertight seal between professional and private life also arises.

The lack of social ties between teams also remains a much-debated subject. Beyond human factors, it s the whole process of project ideation, creativity and collective intelligence that struggles to blossom when teams are separated.

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Review managerial systems

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But the move to teleworking also means introducing new managerial standards.

The pyramidal hierarchical system, with its emphasis on presenteeism and control, is going to have to be replaced by a more flexible management style, which grants trust, autonomy and freedom to the employee.

This is a task for HR departments and management, who will have to review their management methods and train their teams accordingly.

Fortunately, many of them have already taken the plunge. According to the Malakoff Humanis "Telecommuting" survey of June 2020, 63% of employees feel that, over and above a transition to digital tools, the period of confinement has given rise to a supervised evolution in working patterns.

In many companies, new telecommuting protocols are already being studied and are ready for discussion with the social partners.

To conclude, we could quote Emmanuelle Germani, HR Director at Kaporal, who speaks of telecommuting as "an irreversible, inescapable movement that it s better to support than to undergo".

And companies have understood this and are already on the front foot to adapt. The digital transition has taken a historic leap forward in the last 2 months, and it s up to HR departments to minimize the negative impact on employees.

The issue is also being discussed at the highest levels of government. In France, Italy, Spain and Germany, consultations are underway to establish a legal framework for telecommuting.

So the far-reaching changes to working practices that we predicted during the lock-in are well and truly underway.