HR leaders struggle to enforce office return amid workforce pushback

The challenge for HR leaders

Wende Smith, Sr. Director of People Operations at BambooHR, warned that when leaders aren’t aligned over RTO mandates, it creates a disconnect throughout the organisation.

“Executives aren’t immune to the discomfort of policy tension — they’re often feeling it while trying to lead through it,” Smith said in a statement. “HR can play a key role in helping companies define what success looks like in this new era of work.”

According to BambooHR, some of the steps that HR leaders can take include:

• Help leaders adapt to new policies
• Improve the office environment
• Shift the focus from where work is done to how effectively it is completed
• Ensure RTO policies are equitable and inclusive

It also called for a focus on flexibility by offering hybrid work models to allow employees to choose the work environment that best suits their needs.

“A one-size-fits-all approach will always leave some individuals with unmet needs, which is why it’s more effective for work mode policies to be determined by individual departments,” Smith said.