Is flexible working here to stay?

A few years ago, Marc Nohr (pictured above) was something of an anomaly. As the then group CEO of major marketing firm Miroma, Nohr was among a minority of senior business leaders working flexibly. Fast forward and flexible working has been thrust into the mainstream as the pandemic reshaped the world of work. Many questioned whether the traditional office model had been altered forever.

But as we move on in the post-pandemic world, Covid has not revolutionised work in the way many thought it would, says Nohr, one of the UK’s most recognised creative entrepreneurs.

“That whole debate about whether it’s as productive to work from home or flexibly got overtaken by the brutal realities of lockdown where everyone was working from home (if they could). And in the period of adjustment since, we have flipped and flopped between ‘working from home is the new normal’ and ‘actually, working from home is a bit lonely and not conducive to learning and maybe we should we go back to the office.’

“While we shouldn’t mandate that everyone needs to be in the office all the time, there is definitely an enduring role for offices, and I don’t think that Covid revolutionised that.”

Nohr has been a leading figure in the creative industries for over three decades. The former founder of Kitcatt Nohr, one of the UK’s top agencies of the 2000s with clients including Waitrose, Starbucks and Apple, today he works across a portfolio of organisations, including as chairman of creative advertising agency Fold7, strategic marketing consultancy Stick & Twist and London’s Jewish cultural centre JW3. He has just been made chairman of UNTIL, an initiative that helps health and fitness professionals to work on their own terms, and is also working on new ventures in the area of entertainment.

A father of three, Nohr was an advocate of flexible working long before most. In 2018, while chairman and CEO of Fold7 (now part of the Miroma Group), he moved to a four-day-a-week role. He was credited as being the first male chief executive of a large business to announce he did so.

“I looked to some of the most amazing people I know who operate at high levels and who observe their own schedule and I realised there was a connection. Creativity doesn’t happen between nine to five,” says Nohr, who was included in the 2020 Timewise Power 50, which celebrates senior executives working flexibly.

“I also thought about the words of former US senator Joe Lieberman in The Gift of Rest and how observing the Jewish Sabbath is a cornerstone of his week. Switching off for at least a day is vital. Religious Jews have been doing this for thousands of years for a reason. They have ritualised rest and protected it within the week.”

While workplaces are catching up with the benefit of offering flexible working, this is not entirely nor uniformly. Many companies, including giants Amazon, Disney, JP Morgan and Meta have been calling workers back into the office post Covid. And some workers, who were reluctant to return, are finding that maybe it’s not so bad after all. Other businesses are still allowing working from home on a permanent basis.

According to recent ONS government figures, the majority of people – 63.9% – never work from home, while 21.4% work from the office and remotely. Just 7.8% of workers were based at home permanently, the survey said.

Nohr, a member of Hampstead Synagogue, Dennington Park Road, believes everyone should have the opportunity to work from home if their job – and circumstances – allow, but says how much depends on the nature of the job. “For some aspects of the creative industry for example, being in the office is vital, whereas for others, it’s not always conducive. We can’t multitask; it’s a myth. All it means is your attention is shallow and split between competing demands. Working flexibly allows time and space for proper, considered work. To do ‘deep work’, you have to switch off sometimes. I’m evangelical about it.”

For many people, having the opportunity to work flexibly and from home has been transformational; no commute and a better work-life balance. For employers, there’s the reduced overhead costs and a larger talent pool to choose from, as geography doesn’t necessarily matter.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt caused a stir earlier this year by saying that working in the office should be the “default” unless there is a good reason for working from home. He said while working remotely had produced “exciting opportunities”, he was worried about “the loss of creativity” when it is permanent.

“The situation is beyond binary,” says Nohr. “It’s not about ‘stay at home’ or ‘work in an office’ (unless you are a sole worker or can’t work from home). If you want great people you will have to show a degree of flexibility for workers to show that they can align a balance between different parts of their lives.”

He adds: “For collaboration and sharing ideas, there is no substitute for the office. That difference of perspective and richness is very difficult to achieve on Zoom. That kind of collaboration requires people to be present, as does learning from others. What does an apprenticeship mean if sitting at home on your own, especially for young people who may not have a home office so are working from the edge of their bed! For that generation, who want to learn and absorb, we need to see a return to offices.”