At smaller companies, employees might each have their own desk and be able to come and go as they please. At large corporations, clearer policies will be needed to mitigate wasted office space as well as crowding and lack of available workspace. Downsizing the office space Whether you’re allowing employees to choose the amount of in-office days or requiring a set number of office days, you might find that you can downsize your office space. If you encourage shared offices, workspaces, or hot desks in order to save money on the rental, make sure that you have daily sanitation procedures or services in place. Flexible or dedicated work dates At some companies, employees from certain teams can work from home as desired on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, but not on Mondays and Fridays. At first glance, this rule seems designed to limit unapproved extended weekends. So, if you do create policies, make sure that they are easy to understand and don’t risk damage to your company culture by sowing distrust. Google, by contrast, is allowing employees to work with their managers to pick their two work-from-home days and their three work-from-the-office days. Google is also building movable pods with desks and whiteboards that can be rearranged as needed around the office. Hot desk availability management If you plan on having employees share desks as a method of saving on office rent, you’ll need to make sure there are enough spaces available, and that everyone knows when they can and can’t come in. Fortunately, there are no spreadsheets or massive calendars required. You can use a hot desk and hybrid work management software such as Envoy, Chargify, or Office Space to make it easy for employees to claim their spot. Managing hybrid remote work “During the pandemic, we invested in a new, independent office space for our employees to return to, a space that wasn't in a managed building to minimise contact with other people. We have provided all desks with their own sanitation station and placed contactless sanitation dispensers around the building. Cleaning the office space is undertaken by a specialist company every weekend, but we also set time aside at the end of each day for every employee to sanitise their own workstation in preparation for the next day they are working in the office.” Simon Brisk, Founder of Click Intelligence 7 gett.com