Is the Return-to-Office Working for Everyone?
The Bigger Picture
Mandates are rising. Remote-first promises are fading.
Leaders call it “back to normal.”
But maybe this is the moment to ask - what should normal look like now?
Lessons from the First WiW Summit
At our very first Women in Work Summit in 2023, Christine Armstrong and Debbie Wosskow, OBE tackled the central question: How do we design work that brings out the best in people and supports the reality of their lives?
They offered contrasting yet complementary perspectives. Armstrong saw remote work as an opportunity to reset outdated models and create more inclusive, flexible systems. Wosskow, meanwhile, raised concerns about the risk of women losing visibility and momentum in remote settings without intentional strategies to counterbalance it.
Their debate revealed a core tension still shaping today’s return-to-office strategies: how to balance the need for flexibility with the benefits of in-person connection – especially when equity is at stake.
The Hidden Impact of RTO
For many women – especially mothers – a return to the office can mean more than just swapping slippers for a train ticket. It can mean:
Two extra hours a day lost to commuting – hours that might have been used for school runs, homework, or elder care.
Career penalties for those who can’t “show face” five days a week.
An impossible balancing act for the “sandwich generation” caring for teenagers and ageing parents while holding down demanding jobs.
And during long school holidays, the juggle intensifies: weeks of childcare gaps, high-cost kids’ clubs, and the constant switch between work mode and parent mode.
The Case for the Office
The office can still be a powerful space for:
Sparking spontaneous ideas and creative breakthroughs.
Strengthening team relationships.
Providing “overheard in the corridor” learning moments for younger colleagues.
And for women in particular, there’s another critical factor: visibility.
Studies – and lived experience – show that when women are less physically present, they may be overlooked for opportunities, excluded from informal decision-making, and miss out on networking moments that accelerate careers.
The Case for Flexibility
The pandemic gave us a rare real-time experiment in what happens when flexibility becomes the norm – and the results were striking:
Productivity didn’t drop; in many cases, it rose.
Employee retention improved.
Organisations could attract talent from a wider geographic and demographic pool.
Companies like Automattic, Dropbox, Spotify, and Unilever continue to prove that flexibility can work at scale – without diluting performance or culture.
The Current Shift
Across industries, the tone is changing:
More “minimum days in” policies.
Fewer fully remote roles.
Less personal discretion over where and how work happens.
Even PwC, as reported in The Times, has introduced a “traffic-light” dashboard to track attendance via badge swipes, Wi-Fi, and work systems:
Green = 60%+ in the office/on site
Amber = 40–60%
Red = less than 40%
PwC stresses that flexibility remains – with summer early finishes and allowances for caring responsibilities – but the trend is clear: more visibility, more measurement.
The Leadership Challenge
This isn’t a simple “office vs. remote” debate. It’s a leadership test.
As Christine Armstrong said at the first WiW Summit:
“We need workplaces that measure outcomes, not just attendance."
The real question for every organisation is:
"Are we building a workplace that works for everyone – balancing flexibility with visibility – or only for those who can be in the office every day?"
The companies that get this right won’t just retain their best people – they’ll attract them.