Return to Office Mandates: A Step Forward or Backward?

0:00 The topics and opinions express in the following show are solely those of the hosts and their guests and not those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We make no recommendations or endorsements for radio show programs, services, or products mentioned on air or on our web. No liability, explicit or implied shall be extended to W FOURCY Radio or its employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing W FOURCY Radio. What's working on Purpose? Anyway? Each week we ponder the answer to this question. People ache for meaning and purpose at work, to contribute their talents passionately and know their lives really matter. They crave being part of an organization that inspires them and helps them grow into realizing their highest potential. Business can be such a force for good in the world, elevating humanity. In our program, we provide guidance and inspiration to help usher in this world we all want working on Purpose. Now, here's your host, doctor Elise Cortez.

1:04 Welcome back to the Working in Purpose program, which has been brought to you with passionate and pride since February of twenty fifteen. Already, thanks for tuning in this week. Great to have you. I'm your host, doctor Release Cortes. If we have not met before and you don't know me, I'm a workforce advisor, organizational organizational psychologist, management consultant, local therapists, speaker and author. My team and I at gusto Now help companies to enliven and fortify their operations by building a dynamic, high performance culture, inspirational leadership and nurturing managers activated by meeting and purpose. And did you know that inspired employees and purpose led companies outperform their satisfied peers by a factor of two point twenty five to one. In other words, purpose and inspiration are good for the bottom line. You can learn more about us and how we can work together at gustodashnow dot com or my personal site at least Coortes dot com. In today's program, we have with us doctor Monica Mitchell. She's a former Fortune fifty leader with experience and telecommunications networks in itsystems, leadership development, change management, and portfolio management. Her current passions include advisory services to small businesses, research in the area of employee engagement in the era of return to office and AI ethics. Her recent doctoral dissertation explored and sought out how to mitigate return to office mandates in fortune five hundred companies we should be talking about today. She joined today from Dallas, doctor Mitchell, welcome back to Working on Purpose.

2:21 Thank you. It's great to be here. So the last time we were on air together just what seven months ago? You have now since retired from AT and T and now you are, doctor Monica Mitchell. How exciting is that? It is exciting or relief to be done? Amazing? And I learned so much about how our lives changed since twenty twenty and what employees expect from their employers, and that has changed. It really has. And you know that's one of the things when I first met you, as you know when you're at AT and T, immediately I got this is a smart woman. She's got a curious mind. That was my immediate draw to you. And like you. Of course, my research and my books have also looked at how much the world and the world of business and what the workforce wants and needs from the world of work in order to give their best to want to stick around.

3:18 So I'm excited to dive into this conversation, so let's go full barrel. So for our listeners and viewers who haven't yet redigitation like I have, let's talk a little bit. Just share a little bit about your background and also why did you choose to focus on return to office for your research. Well, as it came time for me to do the dissertation, I was neck deep in return to office as the company that I worked for was working through a series of oh, come back one to three days, and then next year it was three to five days, and then they announced that they intended the following year to go full on five days, and the employee base literally was revolting.

4:17 And being a Fortune fifty company, they had people in the Boomer generation, lots of gen X, lots of Millennials, and they were bringing gen Z and working across those generations doing leadership development employee engagements. I expected gen Z to have pretty interesting opinions about that, because they came into the workforce expecting some flexibility. Millennials were having children and really needing flexibility. Gen X and Boomers had been raised corporate careers where you just did what you were told and you didn't ask questions and even they were revolting. Yeah, and my curiosity was just peaked, like what happened that?

5:13 Now all the generations are revolting and we had coffee badging and you know, employees at Dell it was making the news. They were told if you don't do this, you won't be promotable, and vast majorities of them it made the news were like, fine, don't promote me. And so I had to ask myself, Hey, what changed? And b is there something that leadership can do if they really feel like the company needs their people back in the office some number of days of the week that will make this palatable and re engage the workforce. And so as my doctoral project, I wanted to examine what would in fact be some sort of middle ground where the company could get what they wanted, but employees wouldn't outright revolt. So my research questions were why were employees feeling this way? And then what would make them more amenable to what management was asking? And I guess we'll get to some of those answers as we progress.

6:30 Yeah, So listeners and viewers, So what we want to cover in this conversation is want I want her to be able to talk about some of the case for telecommunity, for telecommuting, which is really what we're talking about here, and why employees like it, why they were of course against the idea of having not having access to it, Why do employers not like it, what's the case against it? And then we definitely want to finish the conversation by talking about what would make it palatable, what would make this actually work for both parties. So that's what we're going to focus on here. So we learned, of course during the pandemic that you know here we could be quite productive and efficient and get things done with telecommunity. So and to your point, so much has shanged since twenty twenty. Nobody will ever forget where they were in March of twenty twenty when the world stopped basically, so let's talk a little bit, just start there with this idea here that this idea I know that there's such a connection to satisfaction when we can actually work from a tele telecommunings van toage points. Let's start there.

7:27 If we can, there certainly is satisfaction. I think you do have to back up all the way to March of twenty twenty to realize what changed. They ripped the workplace out from under us. And when we first went remote, I was doing online happy hours and online lunch to make my employees feel supported and not trapped in their houses because we didn't know how to act when we couldn't go to the office. We literally weren't allowed to write. And that lasted a good six eight months, and then they started saying I don't really need that. I've adapted.

8:13 Yeah, yep. And then as we saw the percentage of people dying or getting you know, really really sick and taking months to recover. I think what we saw, particularly in gen Z and some of the older generations that have always just done what they were told, is a reevaluation of work life balance and what are you willing to trade just for money? And they really re examined their value structure. Whereas millennials and gen Z had kind of come into the workforce reevaluating their value structure from the beginning, you had the old oldermployees doing that as well, and so when return to office started, you now had an entire employee base questioning the old work structure. And what we found was they understood the employer could set the rules, but they wanted to return on their investment in getting to and from work and how much energy they put into it, and so they knew they could be a productive at home. What was it really worth to be productive in the office.

9:40 Yeah, And then one thing that we became vastly clear to me and on my research on the various conversations I've had on this general topic, is up until the pandemic, we really did center our whole lives around work. And that meant that wherever we worked, where we lived, it's where our kids went to school, it's what's where we found our friends. And after the pandemic, people moved. You talk about the senior research too. People actually even moved in order to be around more of the people that they wanted to be around or the circumstances in which they wanted to live. And so the workplace was no longer the center of people's lives. And I think that's so important for our listeners and viewers and leaders to understand they're really having trouble letting go of that they are.

10:22 And you know, I think we also forget that because people were working from home, childcare centers began to shut down. They didn't have customers. Well they didn't start back up, not all of them. And so when business leaders announced return to office, sometimes literally with no notice, there were nowhere for those kids to go. Yeah, or the few places that were open could charge twice as much. Right, Well, we didn't give big enough raises to cover twice as much. Right right, Right, So well, let's talk a little bit about what you found. So there's some some of your findings.

11:05 Of course, there's three things, of course that I want to talk about here that really relate to what's what's the employee's perspective on the matter return to office. There's a couple that I want to get to that's going to speak to what can we do to mitigate and create a place where or you know, a medium for return to office. So I know that we already know that one of the things that you found was, of course at the return to office mandate, of course, decreased employee's autonomy and their trust. Let's talk a little bit about that finding. So most companies who declared return to office said it's about collaboration and training the next generation. But a lot of them didn't put the right parameters around the return to office structure. So if you announced one to three days, but you didn't have people in on the same days, and your younger employees weren't going to get mentoring because they would show up and sit alone, and your older employees would show up and there was no one to mentor, and so they're like, why am I here? A lot of companies sold off real estate, and so if everybody did come in on the same day, there weren't enough chairs, which frustrates people. Downtown businesses had closed due to no customers, and so there wasn't enough places to park, not enough places to eat, and employees found that experience to be

12:39 very frustrating. This all created blocks, if you will, to their engagement and their willingness to stay all day actually engaged with their peers, and all of that eventually also impacts productivity. So if we thought we lost productivity just from the commute, we were so wrong. Yeah, and you also talked about how you know, then all those those things where if you've been living working from home and now you're now eating out every day, that's expensive and you're having to park, so all the additional costs that it took to be able to come back to the office that really weren't part of the paycheck either were not really factored in or considered now.

13:28 And I think it's often difficult for the executive layer to remember that when you're in the lass than one hundred thousand range or one hundred and fifty thousand range, twenty one to twenty six percent inflation is a whole lot bigger than your four percent raise. Yeah. Yeah, that was one of your findings was that it did increase the employees costs burdens, And I think that's so so important to understand. So that was one of the other things. And so then the other thing too that you talked about in your fundings that I thought was really interesting was that the mandates negatively impacted mental health and work life balance.

14:14 Yes, one of the things that happened with work from home is because people weren't in the office, they would walk on their lunch hour, walk the dog, take conference calls, going up and down the sidewalk, all kinds of things. Going back into the office. One of my respondents said they gained twenty five pounds because they were eating out instead of healthy meals at home, and they had lost the time for their workout and all of that, you know, starts to add up. One mentioned that they were getting sick two to three more times a year and that was costing them medical expenses to recover because it actual for drugs or whatever. And maybe they were you know, and you know, compromised or whatever. And so there are those problems, both mental health and physical health that are happening cramming people into more crowded spaces.

15:15 Yeah, for sure. One of your other things that you that you've found that I thought was kind of interesting was that attitudes towards their return to office mandates were mixed yet pragmatic. You see that. Yeah, And and most employees said, look, I get that, if the company wants to be in person, I can choose to work there or not. I get that, and I'm willing to make that choice based on you know, whatever's available in my city or the fact that I'm nearing retirement, or you know, whatever my deal is. But I would like to feel like they told me the truth about I am coming back. Don't tell me it's collaboration if there isn't a seat for my whole team, yeah right, don't ask me to bear all the costs make it worth my while. So can I get promoted?

16:19 Will you give me some financial incentive to do this? And can I still have flexibility to take care of my kid's doctor's appointment or you know, are you going to nickel and dimee me on time and call me an exempt employee? M h m hmm. Yeah. You know what I would say to that is, you know, one thing that I'm very keenly aware of that I've had so many other guests on over the over the time talking about some of these issues too, is you know, thinking about we want our Ultimately, people want to have access to their whole life right. They're happy to work hard for you and give their best and really help move the needle. And they also want to be able to see their kids' soccer games. They want to be able to get it'll work out of the morning before they come into work. They want to be able to occasionally have dinner with their family. Gosh, what a concept.

17:07 And so you know, I saw people during the pandemic, you know, the whole parades of caravans of people reconnecting neighbors, adults sipping on something, the kids happily peddling along on their cycles. The dogs happily joining along. And it was this beautiful reconnection that you never saw before until the pandemic. Right, And you know, I think you and I have talked about it. People don't want to do happy hour anymore, but they missed that connection to their neighborhoods that previously. I don't know that we knew we could have. But things changed. People reevaluated live priorities and again at work, they want to be respected, valued, but let to have that other part of their life that we rediscovered exactly.

18:02 Yeah, and what I've said in one of my books is, you know, we can't put the juney back in the bottle. We people have made this realization, this discovery, this evolution has happened. We can't go back in time. We can't go back into the the anals of history. So anyway, I am so delighted to have you want to talk about this because I think it's so so important. And we're going to grab our break here next, so our listeners of yours can kind of think about what has been important for them about return Obviously, if they're dealing with it now, why is flexibility and telecommuting important to them? Because after the break. We want to talk about why employers don't like it and what they're trying to be able to get out of the situation. So let's grab that first break. I'm your host, doctor Alisa Cortez. We've been on the air with doctor Monica Mitchell. She's a former Fortune fifty leader with experience and telecommunications, networks and IT systems, leadership development, change management, and portfolio management. Her current passions today include advisory services to small businesses, researching the area of employee engagement, era of return to office in AI ethics. We'll be right back.

19:19 Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite a lease to speak to your organization, please visit her at Elisecortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise Send an email to a lease Alisee at at least Coortes dot com. Now back to working on Purpose.

20:10 Thanks for staying with us, and welcome back to working on Purpose. I'm your host, doctor release Cortes, as I too, am dedicated to helping create a world where organizations thrife because they're people thrive and they're led by inspirational leaders that help them find to contribute their greatness who do business at betters of the World. I keep researching and writing my own books, so one of my latest came out is called a Great Revitalization How activating meaning and purpose can radically in liven your business. And I wrote it to really in lign with what doctor Monica has been saying too, to help listeners or excuse me, readers understand today's discerning workforce. What do they want to need from you? And then I give you twenty two best practices to equip you in your leadership of your culture. To provide that. You can find my books on Amazon or my personal site at least Coortes dot com if you are just now joining us. My guest is doctor Monica Mitchell, who is the author of the Doctoral dissertation entitled Exploring and Mitigating the impacts of Return to Office in Fortune five hundred company, which we've been talking about on today's program. So for this segment here, let's focus on the view of companies of employers here of the case against telecommunicating telecommunity. So one of the first things that they said, which you and I have talked about, was, oh, productivities declient. So let's talk about that concern from employers.

21:22 So that is a concern that executives have repeated for fifteen to twenty years. This well predates the pandemic. There are numerous academic as well as business studies that show it's blatantly false. People can be productive in a telecommute situation. It depends on how the environment's set up and what you're measuring and the tools that you give the employee, so you can set it up to succeed or fail depending on how you enable the employee and how you train your leaders to engage with employees who aren't sitting with them. And that truly is a leadership function that employers can support or not. And that is a choice, and I think we all know a company can choose that or not. But to just blatantly say well, it's productivity is a bit of a falsehood. And we saw proved in many many corporations during the pandemic that people can be productive when called on to do so. And they were employees came to know that and they just wanted the truth. You need me back in the office.

22:50 Don't make up a lie, tell me the truth. Why do you need me there? What do you want me to accomplish? I need you to value me and my contribution. And if I need to be in the office, tell me what i'm there for. What's my purpose? So that I can do that, but also value that I need some other things. And I think it's very interesting that during the pandemic many executives use the telecommute and we're going to keep you out of the office for your safety as virtue signaling we the great corporations are going to give you this flexibility to keep you safe. And they really advertised it to their customers as, look what we've been able to adjust our business model to do.

23:39 We are putting employees and customers first. And you know, they really held themselves out as heroes for switching to this model. And as soon as they were able to start switching back. It became about re exerting control and under the guise of people aren't as productive, we need to be better for our customers, and employees just didn't buy that. They wanted to know the truth. Are you controlling costs? Do you just not trust me? Just tell me the truth and we can work this together. Yeah, And so part of what you also talked about was that you know, some of the more traditional rooted practices, of course, which is where you know, managers can actually see people. So there was this idea that they could actually monitor them that way because they could see them, and that is that's, of course, you know, managing by presence instead of actually by productivity. And so part of what you also talked about was this notion of that's the wrong focus. If we're focused on presents versus are people actually producing? That would be a better way to be able to ascertain the extent to which these people are productive, not just because I can't see them. I think that's a really critical part of this discussion too.

24:53 Right well, and I think I know at the company I worked at, we got people back in the office and then leadership started saying, but we're not seeing the innovation we want. Well, of course you're not. They're not engaged, right, they're just present, right right. Yeah, it's just amazing. And that was the other thing that I found really interesting about in your research too, just how much you know the decline in full time remote work. I mean you said something like twenty seven percent of workdays were spent at home in May of twenty twenty four compared to sixty percent in May of twenty twenty. Yes, that's a huge difference, a huge decline, so much.

25:37 A huge percentage of the fortune five hundred went to four or more days of work in the office. Now, another huge thing that we heard over and over and over again is that part of the reason that employers don't like the idea of telecommunity is is they feel that it really negatively impacts their culture. Let's talk about that one so well. In the sense that we are trying to bring in gen Z, I believe research is showing that they don't learn well remotely about your corporate values, how you want to treat your customers. That's kind of hard to learn in a fully remote setting. Unfortunately, the way companies went about the mentoring and bringing them back to the office.

26:40 Was this haphazard one to three days and they didn't assign those cohorts of new employees two older mentors who were to be in the office the same day. And so you literally had gen Z folks showing up to an empty office building m h and the mentor showing up the next day to an empty office building, right, and nobody saw the purpose because it wasn't well coordinated. Well, that is a leadership failure, not a factor of where employees work or when. It's literally a lack of coordination and management could have done a better job.

27:25 Yeah, yeah, So from a from the organizational vantage point, doctor Monica, what what else can you help us fill in here? For what why companies have so dug their heels And I personally have been frankly flabbergusted at just the strength of this response. How was fill in this? Why? Why are? Why else are companies so insistent on this return to office? It is a re exertion of executive control. It is a need to address the mentoring uh of gen Z, but a fundamental lack of understanding. They don't want to be in the office five days a week either, They want and value flexibility, but the days they are in, they want planned mentoring and knowing that what they're doing there is going to help build the skills they need for the future, not just checking a box to be there.

28:28 And so I think it's a fundamental misunderstanding of how the workforce is shifting and what it takes to engage them. Yeah, that we're lacking. There's some interesting research another dissertation that was done in one of the Northeast universities showing that really locking in on hard stand as return to office also seems to be related to the pay gap between the CEO and the next highest paid person, and the stronger, higher paid CEOs tend to lock in on it's got to be my way, and this is the way I was raised in corporate America, so that must be the way that works.

29:30 I don't have the research on this, but we have discussed this in other other ways that if you look at some of the demographics, and the generational piece of it too is if you're over like sixty or whatever, which a lot of the CEOs probably are, and to your point, you'll have this comfortable life that you're you're really not able to see and you sort of mentioned this before that you know, there's a whole huge squafth of people out there that don't have that kind of a lifestyle, that aren't being supported in the way that you are as a CEO or as an executive, that are eating that's some kind of flexibility to really make their lives work, and that disconnect is huge, and we had it. One thing that was interesting is during the pandemic, even you know, we could see that the C suite, you know, they were in the same little box on the on the computer screen as we were. We could see when their kids walked by and you know, in their pajamteras or whatever. So it sort of leveled the playing field. But then that went away when we started coming back to the office, right.

30:28 You know. That was one of the things that really started my interest in this research was realizing that we were asking our employees to come back pay for parking, paid double for gas, pay for lunch, but the officers had assigned seats, preserved parking, a gas allowance. They were feeling none of that. Pain, right right, right right, yeah, And I saw I really appreciate just how you've really brought to life some of this what's under this here for the workforce and why are they so resistant? And I so so applaud your work you know, That's why I wanted to have you on. I think I was after you for like months, like when can we talk about this on air? So allri, well, let's grab our last break here and let our listeners and viewers think about if you're a leader, you know, and you're really hanging on this idea of bringing your people back to the office, what is that, what's driving that?

31:28 Consider that as we go on this last break. I'm your host, doctor e Relice Cortes. We run the air with doctor Monica Mitchell. She's a former Fortune fifty leader with experience and telecommunications, networks and IT systems, leadership development, change management, and portfolio management. Our current passions include advisory services to small businesses, research in the area of employee engagement, in the area of return to office, and AI ethics. We've been talking in this segment about why companies are interested and want their employees to return to office after the WAK. We're going to talk about the way forward to make return to office work for both of themployees and employers alike. To be right back, Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite a lease to speak to your organization, please visit her at Elisecortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on Purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to Alise Ali se At at leastcortes dot com. Now

33:03 back to working on Purpose. Thanks for staying with us and welcome back to working on Purpose. I'm your host, doctor Early score Tes. As you know by now, this program is dedicated to empowering and inspiring you along your journey to realize more of your potential. If you want to learn more about how we can work together and learn about the Gusto Now Academy for both leaders and individuals on various journeys alike, make your way to Gustodeshnow dot com and then go to the training tab. You can find the academy there if you are just now joining us. My guest is doctor Monica Mitchell, who is the author of the doctoral dissertation entitled Exploring and Mitigating the Impact Impacts of Return to Office in Fortune five hundred Companies, which we've been talking about on today's program. So for this last segment, let's dive into how we can make this work. And before we get into that, I think it would be useful to talk about the frame that you use to be able to make sense of what you're looking at in your research, and that, as I understand it is the work adjustment theory. Is that right right?

34:00 Remember that I saw this outright revolt and I had to ask, is there something the employer can do to prevent the revolt and come to terms with the employees? And so as I was doing the literature review and looking for some framework that could help me answer that question, I came across this research from nineteen seventies and eighties I think called work adjustment theory, in which they theorized and proved that employers provide an environment and rules and tasks that they need done. The employee provides skills and abilities and they expect payment. And then if the employer changed changes the task or the environment, the worker either has to adjust or they expect more payment or some other adjustment for the adjustments that they're making when the task changes. And that seemed like a good framework for this because we had a completely telework environment. The employer wants to change that environment, which requires the employee to

35:31 make adjustments in their life. And so the question would be, what, then adjustment does the employer need to make to get the employee to make the adjustment they want. And as I questioned the employees who filled out the surveys, I found that a lot of companies expected adjustment on the part of the employee. They didn't expect to provide accommodation for that adjustment. Mm hmmm. Yeah. And there's just so much here. And the cool thing about it and why I love doing the work that we do at Gusta now is helping organizations to be able to provide this. It's not rocket science, but it does require an adjustment on the part of companies, and I couldn't help. As I was preparing for this conversation, I happened to read Rashad to Baka Walla's weekly newsletter.

36:27 He was a previous guest on my podcast and he's brilliant. He's a futurist. And one of the things that he said in his newsletter, which I would like you to comment on, is he says quote companies will access talent anywhere and not limit their search to geography. The current backward lurch to fix locations in five days a week work, though most companies already behind the scene excuse most of the top talent from this will be seen as a failure in leadership to reimagine and as a guys to eliminate workers without severance versus a winning future strategy. That's absolutely spot on. Wall Street is recognizing that a lot of these return to office strategies are cost cutting in disguise. Some companies that I know made bold statements that not only were they doing five day return to office, but it had to be in certain cities, only to realize that fifty other companies wanted to be in the same city, say Dallas, and they couldn't hire the skill sets they needed in something really popular like cybersecurity, and they had to revise their strategy. And go to a completely different state that they hadn't planned to be in in order to get the skill sets. And so you know what your friend has has pointed out there is

38:03 we do need to be able to recruit from just about anywhere in a market where skill sets are hard to find. The company I worked for announced five day hard rto no choice. Just yesterday they've posted they can't get Spanish speaking call center reps. So in San Antonio, if you're bilingual, they'll now give you a hybrid if you can speak both languages. So there's going to have to be flexibility in order for them to get the people they need with certain skill sets. Yeah, yeah, Well, let's finish this conversation by talking about what companies can do to make this work for both them and their interests as well as their employees. And one of the things that one of the themes that you found in your research was that employees desire a better work setting when they are as to return to the office. So what is that better work setting for them?

39:03 What does that look like? They want having desks, maybe a good place to start. Good place to start, they would like parking, okay, fair, And this is you know This is interesting. A lot of the downtown businesses sold off parking, garages and workspace during the pandemic because they almost announced were never going back, so it made sense to get rid of space you weren't using. It helped the bottom line. Then they decided to go back, but they didn't count the employee to seat ratio, or they assumed they could make everybody come back, but there would still be a number of people off every day, similar to the flexible workspace percentages. But that's not true if you're having everyone come back. And what they ended up with was people fighting over parking places, fighting over desks, Teams couldn't sit together. Well, that's not going to get you collaboration right. Some of these office buildings are frankly old. Yeah, nineteen seventies, you know, not updated, And maybe people put up with that in twenty nineteen because we didn't know better. But when you upgraded your own office space at home, and your kitchen was around the corner and you could eat what you wanted for lunch,

40:35 and now you're suddenly asked to go where the facilities aren't as good. You can't get a desk, you can't have three monitors, if that's what you had at home, Employees resent that and they're like, if you're going to have me fight traffic to get here, I want something at least as good as I had on my home desk. A natural light, right, the ability to be able to get out and move, and just having, as you alluded to earlier, some beauty in your environment. I have a calling Marissa Hale who helps design beautiful workplaces like esthetically pleasing and workplaces that are designed to enhance well being in connection, and that goes so far right, so that difference and the improved work setting. So that was definitely one of your findings. Another one that you found one of your other findings was that employees desire growth opportunities.

41:29 When they are asked to come back to work in the office full. Time, they do not want to feel like it's a layoff in disguise and that all coming in is doing is maybe preventing them being on the next list. They want to know that it's a chance at growth that they can get the next promotion, that you're going to enhance their skill set, not just count how many hours they sit there. The atrocious waste of a human life to count their hours that they sit there. Oh my gosh, right, please, you know, they really want you to invest in them, like teach me new skills, help me grow and learn, give me chances for public speaking and mentoring and things that help me grow as a person. If I'm going to bother to be here.

42:23 And I think that's really a pretty reasonable request. Yeah, I do too. We've had other conversations here and it's certainly I've been involved in enough discussions and the work that I'm doing too to help companies. But part of the idea that I think is really important for companies to get their heads around and for leaders to understand, is that you do have to earn the commute today. You can't just demand it. You have to earn that commute. And so part of what I've seen, and I'd love for you to come out of this because I know you've said some of this stuff in your research too. You know, the idea providing experiential learning, So when people are coming into the office, create something, create an event that allows them to learn together, something that is like, wow, this is kind of special, this is different, and this is worth me getting here to the office for connecting the team, even over non work events to help strengthen those relationships and if you're going to do like some joint volunteering together or something in teams, so that whole idea of earning the commute. So if you could speak a bit more about what you've learned about what companies can do to really make this worthwhile for their team.

43:32 Right, you know, it's simple things like getting leadership to sponsor the book club for the new employees where they sit around and they hear your perspective on the book, as well as get to give theirs leaders who take thirty minutes to come in and talk about their career and what experience has taught them the most and why you should take that lateral job movement even though it doesn't look like career growth. Those things are immensely helpful to the new employees set, and they don't get that over a teams meeting. They get it because you grab a cup of coffee and you go sit with a group of them. But that takes intentional involvement and they value those things and it doesn't cost the company much, if anything, but a leader's time. People would also value free parking, which companies can provide if they buy the space, they would value a discount in the cafeteria given inflation.

44:57 I think there are little things the companies can do to make it seem like they care without bearing all of the cost, and to make it seem like they respect the worker and the worker's contribution versus just demand. Yeah. Yeah, what about the idea of providing the food. I mean, I know when I had Adrian court On on the podcast several years ago. I forget which company she worked for, but part of what they did is they did provide lunch for everybody, and it was a way for people to break bread together and connect and such. What about that idea of actually providing food. I think to do that on an occasional basis makes a lot of sense. I don't even know that the Amazons and Googles will continue doing that with the recent legislation that is removing it as a expensable item. Well okay, yeah, so I don't think we're going to see a big trend where a corporations to do it every day because it's going to be no longer expensible. But it is the same as training and investment in the work environment and your employees and camaraderie that to some degree is worth what you spend on it to get that engagement between leadership and employees and employee teams.

46:30 Mm hm. You know, one of the certainly I know you're aware, is one of one of the major concerns that executives have, of course, is the need for upskilling, especially in this age as we're we're embracing AI and automation, and so it seems to me that if we can provide ongoing a reason you know, for another we sent somebody to come to the office would be if we're going to provide you so with some training or some new ways to be able to level up your skills. I mean, that seems like would be another good reason to want to bring people in. A lot of people say, if you want me to come in, feed me? Yeah, in my mind, if feed my stomach, one of the two, yeah, one of the two. Yeah. Well I I you know, I I am a I'm an organizational psychologist, as you know, Monica, because I believe in the wonder, the glory, the power of work in our lives is a place to be able to realize our potential, to be able to make a contribution that we feel good about that, we are proud of as we look back on our lives that we make relationships.

47:27 I met you through the world of work that so I believe in this. I want this to work. And for for when we go into this, this whole posture of I command you to come and do this now, we lose that, We lose that that whole idea of that we're opting into this relationship it is mutually respectful, mutually rewarding, and so any other thoughts on what else companies can do to really make this work for everyone. So I gave this some lot because you had you know, said you kind of wanted to end on that note. And I think we have to realize COVID changed the rules of the game and we don't have to like that, right right, we do have to live with it. And the same old leadership will not get the same results anymore.

48:29 The same old tired buildings and perks won't get the same engagement that we used to get. And we are facing a world in which China wants to win the AI or we don't make all of the products that we need at home anymore. We have to get better at this. Our economy will not survive, so leaders need to step up and figure this out. Well, part of what I would say to that, and of course this is part a big part of what we do at GUSTA now, So I mean, I can't help but not say this, is that it's really fundamental that leaders are upgrading their own operating system, their own capacity to make sense of all this change and chaos, and how they're contributing relating to their employees, and how they are motivating and inspiring them to come along the journey with them. And what I'm discovering, what I see is that so many organizations are not investing in that themselves.

49:37 So the operating engine of the whole organization, that is the executive leadership team itself, isn't elevating into today's times either. And that's a really important place to start. That's absolutely fundamentally true. We still operate and we can mandate it, and we keep forgetting that at the heart of any change are these things called people, these usty things like usky things called people, and you have to make them want to do it right, right right. Well, I really appreciate knowing you, and I really I needed you to come on and share this because I think it's so critical for leaders to understand how this is actually jeopardizing the very success of what they're trying to put forth. So, doctor Monica Mitchell, it's so wonderful to be able to call you doctor now. Thank you again for coming back on working on Purpose. I can't wait to see what you do to help companies elevate what they're out there doing to help support thirteen.

50:35 This has been blast, so welcome. Always more to come. Listeners and viewers. You're going to want to learn more about doctor Monica Mitchell and stay connected to her. See what she's doing with her advisory services that she's offering to small businesses, the research that she has been doing around employee engagement in the era of return to office, and of course AI ethics. The best place to really connect her, to find find her is on LinkedIn, so you will find her by her full name, So it's Mona Browning Mitchell. So Monica Browning brown I g Mitchell last week. If you missed the live show, you can always catch it VI you recorded podcast. We were on the air with doctor Stephen Post who found his purpose and passion early in life as an educator in the medical field. We talked about his latest book, Pure Unlimited Love, Science and the Seven Past to Inner Peace and Today's crazy chaotic times. Helping leaders or any of us for that matter, was exactly in order, and doctor Post gave us some tremendous insights to his long standing research and practice on the matter. Next week, we'll be on the air with Pete Barons talking about his book Into the Fog Leadership Stories from the Edge of Uncertainty.

51:39 See you then, Let's continue leaning in to discover how to elevate your operating system as a leader, become more inspirational, and create destination workplaces where legendary business takes place. Let's work on Purpose. We hope you've enjoyed this week's program. Be sure to tune into Working on Purpose featuring your host, doctor Release Cortes, each week on W four CY. Together we'll create a world where business operates conscientiously, Leadership inspires and passion performance, and employees are fulfilled in work that provides the meaning and purpose They crave. See you there, Let's work on Purpose.