The new normal: should pension firms return to the office?

However, when I speak to clients and friends in broader industry, many of them have accepted that we may already be living the new normal. The 10 per cent of employees who need to or would prefer to go back to the office have in many cases already done so. The rest of our colleagues are rejoicing in their newfound freedom and expect to work from home, unshackled from the dreary commute and the need to make small talk with their co-workers.

There is very little that can take the place of being able to turn to a co-worker and ask them how something is done. Or for a senior to share tips and tricks on noticing someone struggling with a task

The pandemic has proven that remote working is possible. This allows us greater flexibility, less time commuting and the ability for better work-life balance. Organisations can access new pools of talent, reduce real estate costs and recruit lower-cost staff in the regions. So why is the pensions industry so keen on bringing employees back to office, and what are the challenges they will face in the new normal?

The pensions industry has a legacy of end-of-life technology. Data may still be in paper format or even microfiche. Multiple disparate legacy platforms may be difficult to tie together for remote workers. Often pension systems have to sit on-site, due to speed issues.

Security is critical, given that personal and financial data will be accessible from homes around the country. It looks like the pandemic will drive what the Pensions Regulator’s data standards and the dashboard could not. Expect weaker players to fall by the wayside and the more technologically advanced pension companies to thrive.

Employee engagement

Proximity is important to create a team. Global organisations know how difficult it is to manage dispersed teams, and remote working will throw up many challenges. There are only so many Zoom calls that one can do, and it is difficult to have personal or difficult conversations in such an environment.

Finding a methodology to imbibe a cohesive team spirit into a geographically dispersed workforce will define the winners in the post-pandemic future.

Tacit knowledge

My daughter has been struggling to pin down an internship this summer as offices are shut. 

Organisations know that transferring skills and organisation ethos requires sitting together in an office environment. Young interns learn key skills in between making cups of tea and doing the photocopying.

There is very little that can take the place of being able to turn to a co-worker and ask them how something is done. Or for a senior to share tips and tricks on noticing someone struggling with a task. In a remote working environment, the intern does not know what they do not know, and experienced employees have no insight into their daily struggles. 

I would estimate that 90 per cent of the pensions industry is thriving in its new working environment. It is the difficult employees who become 10 times more difficult to manage when remote. This may be an interesting conundrum as in the new world only the self-starters will thrive. The rest may struggle holding down jobs or may need to opt for in-office working.

Office buzz

According to McKinsey research, 80 per cent of people questioned enjoy working from home. However, research by Fram Search suggests that more than 90 per cent would like a mix of office and remote working.

Employees like the office buzz, the companionship, the water cooler gossip, or merely time with their line manager. As such, in the future we will need to create office spaces that attract staff.

Cake, pizza and pool tables are likely to be the new normal. Pension companies will need to become more like Google and less like a 1950s government office.

These are problems that can and will be overcome. The genie is out of the bottle as our employees will have human resources legislation on their side. It has been proven that almost every single role within the pensions industry can be done from home.

It will be the organisation’s job to make it work, productively, profitably and pleasantly. We cannot plan for a post-pandemic organisational structure any longer. The new normal is now.

Girish Menezes is a board director of the Pensions Administration Standards Association, a member of the Pensions Management Institute’s Advisory Council and the head of administration at Premier Pensions