Using Hybrid to Turn

Workplace Vibrant
An Empirical Study about Hybrid Workplace Implications on
Employee Engagement

MASTER THESIS WITHIN: Business Administration

NUMBER OF CREDITS: 30

PROGRAMME OF STUDY: Global Management (M.Sc.)

AUTHORS: Pablo Prevot and Peeter Mägi

JÖNKÖPING May 2022

Acknowledgments

This research would not have been possible without insights we were able to collect from all the
interviewees therefore, we are grateful for your time, openness and comments which contributed
to reaching valuable findings and conclusion. We hope you find meaningful takeaways from this
paper, giving practical dimension to our gratitude to you.

Big thank you goes to our supervisor Jean-Charles E. Languilaire. Your constructive feedback
and direction helped us to stay on track and ensure that the result of our study includes both
theoretical and practical implications, contributing new knowledge in the domain of the so-called
new normal concerning workplace. We would also like to thank the others student groups that
took part in the thesis seminars and provided helpful recommendations to improve our study.

Last, but not least, we especially appreciate the support we received from our families,
employers, friends, and fellow students. Your motivation and guidance helped us to complete
this research as well as come through the two-year program overall.

Thank you!

Pablo Prevot & Peeter Mägi

May 23, 2022

Master Thesis in Business Administration

Title: Using Hybrid to turn Workplace Vibrant - An empirical study about hybrid
workplace implications on employee engagement
Authors: Pablo Prevot and Peeter Mägi
Tutor: Jean-Charles Languilaire
Date: 2022–05-23
Key terms: Hybrid work, hybrid workplace, extensive remote working, remote working,
employee engagement, work engagement, work-life balance.

Abstract
Background: Sudden change in work routine, as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic,
disrupted the historic patterns and created phenomena where people were
forced to work remotely for a long-term period. Even when the restrictions
were eased after the pandemic, business-as-usual concerning workplace
was challenged since employees did not want to return to their 9-5 jobs.
Therefore, employers are forced to rethink their legacy approach
concerning where and when work can be conducted.
Research Problem: With both employees and employers mutually convinced about the need
for redefining how work can be executed, in parallel with negative
correlation existing between extensive remote work and employee
engagement, calls for exploring alternative flexible working
arrangements.
Research Purpose: In the context where neither extensive remote work nor fully on-site
setups are perceived as the optimal workplace solutions after the Covid-
19 pandemic, a hybrid approach may provide middle-ground, ideally
combing the positive elements from both home- and corporate office
workplaces, resulting in an enhanced employee engagement. Hence, the
purpose is to understand how hybrid workplace impacts employee
engagement.
Research Question: What are the implications of hybrid workplace on employee
engagement?
Research Method: This research is qualitative and inductive, following relativism ontology
and social constructionism epistemology. Grounded Theory as
methodology, and data collected through 12 semi-structured interviews,
concluded with grounded analysis to conduct interpretation and analysis.
Conclusion: The outcome of this study confirms that employee engagement is affected
by hybrid approach as a workplace arrangement, either positively or
negatively, dependent on conditions how hybrid approach is configured
and implemented. Hybrid workplace elements which impact employee
engagement were identified and are presented in this paper.

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Table of Contents

1. Introduction ................................................................................................................................5
1.1 Background: “Business as Usual” is Challenged with Remote Work .................................5
1.2 Problem Discussion..............................................................................................................9
1.2.1 Employee Engagement............................................................................................... 10
1.2.2 Hybrid Workplace ...................................................................................................... 12
1.3 Research Purpose .............................................................................................................. 14
1.4 Delimitations ..................................................................................................................... 14
2. Research Methodology and Methods .................................................................................. 15
2.1 Research Philosophy ......................................................................................................... 15
2.1.1 Ontology......................................................................................................................... 15
2.1.2 Epistemology ................................................................................................................. 16
2.2 Qualitative Research ......................................................................................................... 16
2.3 Research Approach ........................................................................................................... 17
2.4 Literature Review to Develop our Research Problem and Purpose .................................. 18
2.5 Research Methods ............................................................................................................. 19
2.5.1 Data Construction....................................................................................................... 20
2.5.2 Selection of Informants .............................................................................................. 21
2.5.3 Interview Design ........................................................................................................ 22
2.6 Data Analysis .................................................................................................................... 24
2.7 Research Quality ............................................................................................................... 25
2.8 Ethical Implications .......................................................................................................... 26
3. Empirical Findings, Interpretation and Discussion ................................................................. 27
3.1 Distinguish Hybrid Work from Extensive Remote Work ................................................. 30
3.1.1 Extensive Remote Work Characteristics .................................................................... 30
3.1.2 Hybrid Work Characteristics...................................................................................... 30
3.2 Reasons Behind Hybrid Work Becoming Widely Accepted ............................................ 32
3.2.1 Change in Perspective ................................................................................................ 32
3.2.1.1 Change of Mindset .................................................................................................. 32
3.2.1.2 COVID-19 Pandemic and Adaptability .................................................................. 33
3.2.1.3 Technology.......................................................................................................... 34
3.2.1.4 Upside for the Company ..................................................................................... 35
3.3 Factors Affecting Hybrid Work Experience ..................................................................... 36
3.3.1 Successful Hybrid Work Pre-requisites ..................................................................... 36
 3.3.1.1 Hybrid Work Design ........................................................................................... 37
3.3.1.2 Individual Approach............................................................................................ 39
3.3.1.3 Hybrid Work Implementation ............................................................................. 41
3.3.1.4 Hybrid Work Steady State .................................................................................. 43
3.3.2 Role of Leadership ..................................................................................................... 44
3.3.2.1 Change Management ........................................................................................... 44
3.3.2.2 Communication ................................................................................................... 45
3.3.3 Future Office .............................................................................................................. 46
3.3.3.1 Purpose of the Office .......................................................................................... 46
3.3.3.2 Functional Office ................................................................................................ 47
3.3.3.3 Social Gatherings ................................................................................................ 48
3.3.3.4 Regular Interval Employee Survey ..................................................................... 49
3.4 Hybrid Work Conditions with Potential Negative Influence ............................................ 50
3.4.1 Lack of Interaction ..................................................................................................... 50
3.4.1.1 Loose of Culture...................................................................................................... 51
3.4.1.2 Employee Turnover ................................................................................................. 51
3.4.1.3 Isolation ................................................................................................................... 52
3.4.1.4 Newcomers Struggle ............................................................................................... 52
3.5 Hybrid Work Conditions with Negative Influence ........................................................... 53
3.5.1 Work-life Balance and Overwork .............................................................................. 53
3.5.2 Drop in Engagement and Extensive Remote Work ................................................... 54
3.6 Positive Aspects of Hybrid Work ..................................................................................... 55
3.6.1 Work-life Balance and Working from Home Characteristics .................................... 55
3.6.2 Build Company Culture and Interaction .................................................................... 56
3.6.3 Enhanced Employee Engagement, Increase in Motivation, and Energy.................... 57
3.7 Conclusion of Findings ..................................................................................................... 59
4. CONSLUSION ....................................................................................................................... 62
4.1 Answer to Purpose ............................................................................................................ 62
4.2 Theoretical Implications.................................................................................................... 63
4.3 Practical Implications ........................................................................................................ 64
4.4 Limitations ........................................................................................................................ 66
4.5 Future Research................................................................................................................. 66
References .................................................................................................................................. 69
Appendixes................................................................................................................................. 77
Appendix 1 ................................................................................................................................. 77

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Appendix 2 ................................................................................................................................. 80
Appendix 3 ................................................................................................................................. 83

List of Tables
Table 1. Positive and Negative Aspects Related to Remote Working (RW) ................................8
Table 2. Informants Overview .....................................................................................................22
Table 3.1 Codes-to-theory Model, Part 1 ....................................................................................28
Table 3.2 Codes-to-theory Model, Part 2 ....................................................................................29

List of Figures

Figure 1. Reasons Behind HW Becoming Widely Accepted ......................................................32

Figure 2. Factors Affecting Hybrid Work Experience ................................................................36
Figure 3. Hybrid Workplace Conditions with Potential Negative Influence ..............................50
Figure 4. Hybrid Workplace with Negative Influence ................................................................53
Figure 5. Positive Aspects of HW ...............................................................................................55
Figure 6. Hybrid Workplace Implications on Employee Engagement........................................61

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List of Abbreviations

EE Employee Engagement

F-to-F Face to Face

GA Grounded Analysis

GT Grounded Theory

HW Hybrid Work/Workplace

ICT Information and Communication Technology

INT Interviewee/Informant

RQ Research Question

RW Remote Work/Working

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1. Introduction
______________________________________________________________________

The introduction chapter equips the reader with understanding of the context and logic
leading to the research question (RQ) and consists of the following four sub-sections:
background, problem discussion, research purpose and delimitations. The background
section elaborates on Remote Working (RW) as the first key variable of this paper. The
problem discussion part provides insights on two other central variables of this study,
namely Employee Engagement (EE) and Hybrid Workplace (HW). Thirdly, the research
purpose segment presents the research question. Fourth and final sub-section, i.e.,
delimitation, outlines the topics, potentially related to the RQ but not covered in this
research.
______________________________________________________________________

1.1 Background: “Business as Usual” is Challenged with Remote Work

Generation change, developments in the digital workplace (Tanpipat et al., 2021), and the
recent Covid-19 pandemic have created a “perfect storm”, disrupting the way how and
where work can be conducted (Hu, 2020). Already an ongoing trend towards RW was
accelerated as the response to the pandemic, turning the RW into a mainstream workplace
solution. The so-called “new normal”, with governments easing the restrictions and
employees allowed to return to their offices, provides both challenges and opportunities
for organizations given that employees have faced both pros and cons of RW during the
pandemic. An example of unexpected phenomena, especially since it started in midst of
the pandemic, is the so-called Great Resignation where employees in large numbers are
quitting their jobs because of not wanting to return to their 9-5 jobs accompanied by long
commute times after the lockdowns (Homegardner, 2021). In other words, “business as
usual” concerning the workplace is challenged and employers are forced to rethink their
approach in order to retain the talent. Airbnb, the home-sharing platform, recently
announced their decision to let employees work and live from anywhere after the initial
plan, i.e., trying to convince employees to return to the office after the pandemic, failed
(Shead, 2022). This type of trial-and-error tactic, similar as exercised by Airbnb, poses
risks not all companies can take. Therefore, understanding the learnings from the
pandemic and listening to employees’ feedback can lead to a more sustainable approach.
Exploring the down- and upsides what working from home meant for employees and the

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reasons why there is a lack of interest in returning to the offices, although the pandemic
related restrictions are being removed, is expanding the knowledge around the RW in
parallel with exploring optimal solutions both employees and employers can have
practical use of. The starting phenomenon of this work is thus RW.

Remote Work, as a trend challenging the traditional work concept, existed before the
Covid-19 but the response to the pandemic accelerated the phenomena, turning RW
largely into a mandatory and long-term setup (Baakeel, 2021). As an example, Americans
delivered half of the paid work hours from home during April-December’2020 compared
to only 5% before the pandemic (Barrero, 2020). Similarly in the UK, when comparing
the year 2019 to the Covid-19 lockdown period, the percentage of people working
remotely raised from 6% to 48% (Philips, 2020). The pandemic, and different regulations
it triggered to contain the spread of the virus, resulted in most countries introducing
lockdowns at such a speed which left employees and employers switching to RW without
preparation and coordination around how to establish the new working practices (Wood
et al., 2021). This type of sudden and rushed change in work routine, where most of the
white-collar employees used to work at the company office from nine to five, disrupted
the historic patterns and created phenomena where people were forced to work remotely
from home for a long-term period.

Felstead et al., (2017) acknowledges that paid employment is no longer limited to

designated hours performed in a specific place, especially in the case of white-collar
workers. Tele- and virtual working used either as interchangeable terms with RW or as
sub-categories under RW (Adisa et al., 2021; Lunde et al., 2022; Yang et al., 2021), stand
for opportunity to work from elsewhere than the conventional and fixed office provided
by the employer. Halford (2005) concludes that RW was made possible with the
introduction of the ICT which decreased the relevance of space and enabled to conduct
work from anywhere and anytime. Ideal jobs for RW are those with a low or a very high
level of autonomy, with the latter suited for RW because of including autonomous
activities while jobs with low level of autonomy enable easy control in the RW
environment (Slavkovic, 2021). In the context of this research, RW stands for employee
executing his/her work responsibilities at a distance location, primarily from home-office.

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With mixed views on RW future, while some believe that employees will eventually
return to the company provided office full time (Fernandez, 2022) others share the view
that virtual working is here to stay (Moglia et al., 2021) while in parallel admitting certain
downsides RW can pose (Meluso, 2022). Further positive and negative aspects, related
to the RW, derived from various sources and with mainly focusing on employee point-
of-view, are illustrated in Table 1.

As shown in Table 1, employees appreciate the flexibility the RW brings, including the
ability to choose where to work from. On other hand, enforced RW, as was the case during
the pandemic, resulted in limited workplace flexibility since gave little to no choice to
employees regarding their work location because most of the employees needed to work
extensively from home (Yang et al., 2021). Toscano et al., (2020) research shows a
decrease in remote work satisfaction because of social isolation employees dealt with
when working for a long period only from their home office. The similar trend is
conveyed by the pros and cons stated in Table 1, whereas in general positive notions about
the RW show also negative signs due to isolation and lack of social interaction, with both
are being intensified during the pandemic. Therefore, people enjoy the freedom and
autonomy the RW brings but also acknowledge the risks an extreme approach, i.e., fully
RW, can pose. Nevertheless, the remote work experience has created a change in
individuals’ perceptions about work and the workplace (Waizenegger et al., 2020). A
raise in RW popularity can be explained by most employees wanting to go back partly to
the office while still have the option to work remotely (Moglia et al., 2021; Yang et al.,
2021). Therefore RW, in some form or shape being constant in the future workplace
equation, poses relevant and interesting topic to research.

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Author Negative about RW Positive about RW
Knowledge sharing hindered;
Increase in employee productivity, job effectiveness and (virtual-)
Baakeel, 2021 Difficult to separate job tasks and family life;
communication
Performance of an employee might be hard to notice
Increased stress due to socio-spatial isolation of working from home and Relative peaceful and quiet environment at home, enabling less distracted
Halford, 2005
its impact on individual career progression execution of certain tasks
Increased employee flexibility and autonomy, contributing to greater
Hill et al., 2021 Lack of social connection and human interaction
productivity
Save time for those who have long commutes to the workplace, freeing up time
for non-work activities;
Anderson et al., Able to use breaks during working day to carry out caring, domestic or leisure
Work and family conflict
2020 activities;
Avoiding a complex or arduous journey to work may remove a source of stress
for employees and thereby contribute to better well-being;
Negative effect on job performance;
Slavkovic, 2022 Cyber security as challenge for many organizations when working Higher job satisfaction (as cited in Boom et al., 2015)
remotely
Bentham, 2021 Employee isolation Improved employee retention due to greater level of job satisfaction
Felstead et al., 2020 Deterioration in mental health Greater level of convenience and relative quietness
Employee mental health and well-being negatively impacted, based on
Adisa et al., 2021 Flexibility to work anywhere at any time
research on remote working during the Covid-19 pandemic
Positive link between remote work activities and organizational performance (as
Ferreira et al., 2022 Boundaries between family and work started to blur
cited in Kim at al., 2021)
Can cause lack of concentration and work-life conflict as a result, based
Chanana et al., 2020 Culture of openness; new ideas (in case organization is engaging RW employees)
on remote working during the Covid-19 pandemic

Table 1. Positive and Negative Aspects of Remote Working (RW)

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1.2 Problem Discussion
Employers, who in the past have been resistant to staff working from home, have
witnessed that several jobs can successfully be conducted remotely, which potentially
leads towards more flexible workplace setups in the future (Anderson et al., 2020). With
both employees and employers mutually being convinced about the need for redefining
how work can be executed, lays the foundation for accelerating transformation in an area
that otherwise is rather conventional and where changes would have otherwise taken a
significantly longer time. At the same time, Anderson et al., (2020) highlights the
importance of employers not rushing the change in policies and practices but rather being
cautious and considering the remote work (RW) related decisions case by case.

Considering Andersson’s points, we conducted a literature search with a focus on how

company ought to address change in working process. Searching for academic articles by
using the keywords “remote work” or “remote working” in the Web of Science database,
the number of hits is as the following per year: 16 in 2019, 190 in 2020, and 501 in 2021.
Similarly, the number of hits shows an increasing trend when combining search for
keywords “remote work” and “engagement”, although in a much lesser extent compared
to “remote work” as a standalone variable. Combining keywords “hybrid work” and
“engagement” gives 2 hits only. The search examples are shown in the Appendix 1 and
illustrate that an increasing number of academic papers, studying RW from various
perspectives, have been written during the Covid-19 pandemic. This means, with also
explicitly being highlighted in some of the studies (Adisa et al., 2021; Anderson et al.,
2020; Mukherjee, 2021), that RW during the pandemic was influenced also by other
factors like job security and anxiety. Still, we believe that the analysed and referred
sources provide adequate insights on RW, relevant also after the pandemic when
countries have lifted the restrictions. One of these aspects relevant beyond Covid is, from
our understanding, employee engagement.

Indeed, an increasing number of academic papers (Adisa et al., 2021; Baakeel, 2021),
which illustrate the negative correlation between RW and employee engagement, were
written during the Covid-19 pandemic when the nature of RW was extensive and even
mandatory in large extent. This draws concentrated attention to exploring an alternative
workplace solution that equally would meet employees’ desire for flexibility and other
positive aspects of RW, without hindering employee engagement as the extensive remote

9
working did to some extent. In the current literature, little is known about the relationship
between hybrid workplace and its’ relation to work and organisation (Halford, 2005).
Hybrid workplace setup could potentially serve as a silver lining that includes the best of
two worlds. Employee engagement is related to the wide range of other behaviours and
attitudes employee engagement influences. As an example, more engaged employees lead
to more productivity at workplace, generating more customer satisfaction and
development of profits (Chanana, 2020).

Understanding the relationship between what type of hybrid workplace model would
ideally enhance employee engagement, will add further rigour to this increasingly popular
topic. Therefore, we will be providing a fresh dimension on the recently accelerated RW
usage, with a focus on hybrid workplace setup and its effect on employee engagement.

The literature concerning hybrid work has been praised to increase employees' well-
being, and productivity as well as tackling some issues that intensive remote work has
engendered. Studies link employee engagement to flexible work arrangements (Duque et
al., 2020; Gerards et al., 2018), well-being and employee health (Veromaa et al., 2017),
as well as working in a physical environment (Surma et al., 2021). Hence, since a Hybrid
workplace enables similar features, it is fair to consider the relationship between
employee engagement and a hybrid setup.

Additionally, as mentioned earlier, hybrid workplace offers flexible work arrangements

and increased autonomy (Naor et al., 2022; Niebuhr et al., 2022), which can be beneficial
for employee engagement (Sophie & Pierres-Yves, 2021). A gap can be found in the
literature as little information is known about the relationship of hybrid work and
employee engagement. As Sophie & Pierres-Yves, (2021) state, there is a need to further
investigate the concept of engagement and as an end goal increase commitment to work.

In the following sub-sections, the two other main variables additionally to RW, i.e., EE
and HW, are given a closer look, explaining the relationship between the three.

1.2.1 Employee Engagement

Our definition of employee engagement follows the idea of Chanana (2020), which states
that employee engagement is a workplace behaviour where workers try to give their best
due to their commitment to the values and goals of the company. Additionally, employee

10
engagement is often characterized as an inner state of mind where employees aim to
engage cognitively, emotionally, and physically in their role in the company (Chanana,
2020; Kahn, 1990). Engaged employees have a desire to make a difference as well as a
strong concern to perform and work well inside the company (Chanana, 2020). Employee
engagement has become increasingly relevant for companies, even to the extent of being
qualified by global companies as a key success factor (Surma et al., 2021) since it has a
direct impact on work culture and turnover (Chanana, 2020), further justifying its’
selection for our research focus. Furthermore, as mentioned before in the definition,
employee engagement is often associated with a willingness to participate in the success
of the company (Albrecht, 2010; Chanana, 2020), it explains its growing importance
amongst companies and a need to find various ways to engage the company’s workforce
(Surma et al., 2021).

As mentioned before, COVID-19 has drastically changed the ways of working by forcing
RW as a long-term and extensive solution, consequently impacting employee engagement
in several ways. Slavkovic (2022) highlights the correlation between loneliness, due to
working from home, and a lower work engagement. Increased stress related to remote
working impacts negatively employee engagement (Adisa, 2021). Additionally, Surma et
al., (2021), points out the importance of social factors to increase the engagement of
employees, which is lacking and exacerbated for most employees in a fully RW option
(Marshall et al., 2007). An extensive body of literature has found that work-life balance
has an impact on employee engagement (Halbesleben, 2010, Timms et al., 2015). In case
of a lack of resources, this could engender work-life conflict, harming engagement
(Mache et al., 2016). As there is a direct relation between work-life balance and employee
engagement, we can also deduce that RW impacting work-life balance could also
influence employee engagement. Ferreira et al., (2021), states that RW has had a positive
influence on work-life balance since it enables greater flexibility and mobility. Wood et
al., (2021) follows this idea, by presenting RW to decrease work-family conflict leading
to higher job satisfaction as it would allow the employee to interact face-to-face with their
family. Nevertheless, the enforced nature of RW that was presented during the pandemic
has restricted the flexibility of employees and created scenarios of unpreparedness
affecting work-life balance (Wood et al., 2021) and productivity (Yang et al., 2021).

11
Additionally, Platts et al. (2022), mentions that work-life-conflict has increased due to
the fading of boundaries when working from home.

Since enforced RW has restricted flexibility and was confronted with cases of
unpreparedness, as well as a lack of boundaries in households decreasing work-life
balance, it is fair to consider that it has also influenced employee engagement. RW has
directly and indirectly influenced engagement and is becoming more prevalent as an
alternative when having lower restrictions for workplace setups.

1.2.2 Hybrid Workplace

Positive characteristics of RW, and the home-working experience employees gained
during the pandemic, pose a challenge to the traditional work definition and norms in a
less regulated workplace. On other hand, management and HR are struggling to agree on
what exactly the model of new normal should look like (Delany, 2022). McKinsey
conducted survey (Alexander et al., 2021) showed that 30% of employees would likely
switch jobs if their organization would consider fully on-site work after the pandemic,
and over half of the informants expressed their desire for organizations to adopt more
flexible hybrid virtual-working model. Those responses provide insights on how the
fundamentals of the workplace, and work in general, have been impacted by the pandemic
and why it is important to understand the employee engagement drivers in a less regulated
workplace.

After 2 years from the beginning of the pandemic, several countries are lifting the
restrictions which consequently demands decision-making from organizations in terms of
how the future workplace should look like and to what extent and form will RW be
deployed. The “new normal” calls for questioning the traditional patterns and concepts,
urging employers to land on a solution that will contribute to employees’ wellbeing and
motivation (Mukherjee, 2021). In this light, and with many organizations evaluating the
so-called hybrid approach as a way forward, exploring the nature of the hybrid workplace
setup from the employee engagement perspective, provides an interesting and relevant
topic to research.

An approach that has been aborded as a solution for a future workplace with lower
restrictions, is a hybrid work environment (Amigoni, 2021; Moglia et al., 2021; Naor et

12
al., 2022) since it combines the benefits of remote work as well as working in the office
(Babapour Chafi et al., 2021; Halford, 2005; Moglia et al., 2021). The concept of hybrid
work refers to the idea of employees combining work from home with working also from
the company office. Accenture (2021) mentions that employees in a hybrid setup should
work at least 25% of their work time at home, mixed with the option to work from a
traditional workplace such as an office. By having a better balance concerning part-time
RW through a selection of the workplace more evenly, it may increase employee's
motivation and emotional health (Biron & van Veldhoven, 2016). Golden (2006) and
Gajendran and Harrison (2007), suggest that it would be ideal for employees to work from
2 to 2.5 days remotely to increase their satisfaction. A hybrid workplace has been defined
by Halford, (2005) as a multiply located workplace connected via ICTs. This study will
follow this definition since it correlates with our idea of a hybrid workplace. The hybrid
format enables employees to actively choose which way of working fits the best
considering the benefits of each workspace (Babapour Chafi et al., 2021; Halford, 2005).
This leads to a more effective work environment since employees can select which
environment is most suited (Babapour Chafi et al., 2021; Halford, 2005). For example,
employees could choose to work remotely to be more efficient in certain tasks and in a
less distracting environment as mentioned in Table 1. Implementing a hybrid setup would
combine remote work advantages such as schedule flexibility as well as location
flexibility as seen in Table 1, giving greater freedom to employees which can lead to
increase satisfaction (Hill et al., 2010; Teevan et al., 2021, Yang et al., 2021).
Furthermore, higher workplace flexibility is positively correlated to employee outcomes,
increasing workers' productivity as well as work-life balance (Yang et al., 2021).

As mentioned by Teevan et al., (2021), most employees would prefer a hybrid workplace
as an alternative by combining working part-time from the office and home. Additionally,
it was stated by Caminiti, (2022) that most white-collar employees would prefer the
option to blend remote and office work. According to a Microsoft survey from 2021 and
Niebuhr et al, (2022), this is due to employees’ expectations of combining remote and
on-site advantages to increase their productivity, better work-life balance, higher job
satisfaction, and higher autonomy. Microsoft has already embraced this concept as it
plans to incorporate a hybrid workplace for employees that would want this type of setup
as regulations will be lowered by enabling its employees to choose which day they would

13
want to work in the office (Naor et al., 2022). In this study, we consider a hybrid
workplace as the main alternative for future workplaces since there is a clear preference
for this type of setup (Teevan et al., 2021). Nevertheless, we suppose that other types of
setups will still cohabit with the concept of hybrid workplace, and will not be disregarded
but adopted by a minority of employees or companies. Thus, this explains why we define
the concept of hybrid workplace as an alternative.

1.3 Research Purpose

Based on the background and discussion above, it becomes evident that in the context
where neither extensive remote work nor fully on-site workplace setup is seen as the
optimal solutions after the Covid-19 pandemic, a hybrid approach may provide an
intriguing middle-ground, ideally combing the positive elements from both remote work
and on-site workplace, resulting in an impact on employee engagement. Therefore, our
research question is:

“What are the implications of hybrid workplace on employee engagement?”

Considering this question, the purpose of this research is to understand the relationship
between hybrid work and employee engagement.

1.4 Delimitations
Acknowledging the various dimensions HW as a topic can include, and the extent of
perspectives the selected research question could cover, it is relevant to underline the
limitation of not deep diving into the ICT domain and how it can influence HW
experience.

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2. Research Methodology and Methods
______________________________________________________________________

This chapter focuses on choices related to methodology in terms of research philosophy,

qualitative research, research approach, literature review as well as choices of empirical
research methods. It ends with reflections on quality insurance and ethical
considerations. The purpose of the study is to explore the concept of a hybrid workplace
and its impact on engagement; thus, the research methodology and methods were chosen
to get as many insights and perspectives from our informants as possible, allowing theory
to emerge from data.
______________________________________________________________________

2.1 Research Philosophy

Depending on the choices concerning the research philosophy, Ontology, and
Epistemology, the research such as how data was collected, the interpretation of the
findings will be completed differently (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). Therefore, we
present below our Ontology and Epistemology.

2.1.1 Ontology
Ontology refers to individuals’ view of the nature of reality, the ontological assumptions
change the way the researcher sees and studies his research material (Saunders et al.,
2016). Hence, the ontological choice affects what to research (Saunders et al., 2019). To
have a better understanding of the concept of hybrid workplace arrangement and its
relationship to engagement, it is important to look at different viewpoints and opinions
from employees that have experienced a hybrid setup to build our theory since there is no
clear answer from the existing literature. Additionally, our study has considered a variety
of perspectives about a hybrid setup and each will be considered as truth. Based on that
view, our paper applies the relativist ontology. Relativism emphasizes that individuals
perceive experiences differently in function of distinct factors such as their social status,
background, and culture (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). Considering this view, our paper
tries to capture those experiences and construct theory to best describe the implications
of putting in place a hybrid setup in terms of employee engagement. Additionally,
Easterby-Smith et al., (2018) mentions that the relativism ontology implies that there is
not an absolute truth, and facts are dependent on the observer's viewpoint.

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2.1.2 Epistemology
Epistemology focuses on how us, as researchers think knowledge is created, what
knowledge is regarded as acceptable and legitimate as well as how we can justify its
validity (Saunders et al., 2019). Epistemology is divided into two views, positivism, and
social constructionism. Positivism often assumes that objective facts are best suited and
would likely be linked to a quantitative research method. In contrast, social
constructionism focuses on the idea that knowledge is decided by people and their view
of the world as well as trying to make sense of their experiences rather than objective
facts. Building upon that, it views that reality is constructed through social interactions
and disregards the reality that is objective and exterior (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018).
Accordingly, for our study, it is important to focus on our informants' experiences and try
to understand their core such as emotions, thoughts, and engagement when using a hybrid
setup. Furthermore, the perceived engagement while using a hybrid setup might variate
from each informant as each has a different view depending on the field of work,
generation, hybrid guidelines, or how the company implemented their hybrid setup. As
this paper aims to explore the implications of a hybrid setup on employee engagement,
and considering the lack of knowledge concerning this topic, as well as different opinions
on the matter, it becomes key to create our own knowledge based on our informants'
opinions. The dimension of social constructionism aligns with this paper, as it is more
compatible with our view of ‘the most appropriate way of enquiring into the nature of the
world’ (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 109). Following a social constructionism
dimension, it is important to collect different opinions concerning our informants'
experiences in a hybrid environment and their perceived engagement. Hence, interaction
with the selected informants allows us as researchers to have a more profound
understanding of the topic, ultimately create the new knowledge what is relevant in the
context of hybrid workplace and employee engagement.

2.2 Qualitative Research

Researchers have a broad umbrella for the selection of the methodology, divided into
quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods. Our paper is focusing on qualitative
research since it further pushes the idea of trying to understand people’s experiences and
insights (Denny & Weckesser, 2019), which aligns with our decisions on the research
philosophy, purpose and would give further insights concerning the topic at hand. In more

16
detail, qualitative research focuses on the understanding of the thought process of
individuals and individuals' actions (Denny & Weckesser, 2019). As having an overview
of the thought process of our informants and their actions concerning the concept of a
hybrid workplace and the perceived engagement would add further value to our research,
qualitative is the most suited. Additionally, one of the key characteristics of qualitative
research is to compensate for the existing lack of knowledge to amplify the existing theory
by collecting data (Ketokivi & Mantere, 2010; Easterby-Smith et al., 2018), which
mirrors our situation concerning the relationship of hybrid work approach and
engagement.

2.3 Research Approach

Research approaches have conventionally been divided into two categories, deductive
and inductive (Frigg & Hartmann, 2006). By using a deductive approach, the researcher
starts from theory to end with specific hypotheses, while limiting the intervention of the
researchers and trying to be detached from the study (Ketokivi & Mantere, 2010). On the
contrary, inductive approach, often starts from missing or contradicting knowledge in the
literature to build a theory from the data collected. Hence, this explains why inductive is
often characterized as increasing the existing knowledge (Ketokivi & Mantere, 2010),
and is useful for our case, since as mentioned in the problem discussion at the start of our
study, a lack of theory and concepts can be noticed concerning engagement and hybrid
work. How to increase employee engagement has been discussed extensively in the
literature, nevertheless the concept of hybrid workplace, and its impact on employee
engagement, is quite vague as it has not been examined in detail. Given the growing
importance of employee engagement among companies and the possible usage for
companies of a hybrid setup, it becomes key to understand the relationship between those
two.

Furthermore, this approach is explorative as our objective is to understand the impact of

a hybrid setup on employee engagement, due to a lack of theory concerning this topic, it
supported our choice of an inductive explorative approach. Additionally, the ‘What’ from
our RQ, further emphasizes the explorative nature of our study (Saunders, 2016), aiming
to generate valuable knowledge. Charmaz (2006), proposes a constructivism grounded
theory where ‘we are part of the world we study and the data we collect’ (Charmaz, 2006,
p. 10). Our thoughts are that us, as researchers have an impact on the data collected and

17
can be considered as co-constructor of meanings due to the reflection of our
interpretations. We acknowledge our subjectivity, as our findings are not considered
‘accurate renderings of these worlds’ (Charmaz, 2014, p. 14). This idea follows the
perspective of Charmaz (2006) who views that theory conception follows an ‘interpretive
portrayal of the studied world, not an exact picture of it’ (p. 10). Additionally, Charmaz
(2006) proposes her concept of grounded theory that emphasizes on flexible guidelines
and more open practices, further allowing the findings to emerge from the data and thus
the construction of knowledge that this paper aims for. Hence, it paved a way to choose
the perspective of Charmaz as it is the most compatible with our ideas

Overall, the study follows the constructivist perspective of Charmaz (2006), as the study
focuses on the different experiences and opinions of our informants in a hybrid workplace
to construct knowledge and answer our purpose to understand the relationship between
the hybrid approach and employee engagement.

2.4 Literature Review to Develop our Research Problem and Purpose

As the literature about the relationship between hybrid workplace and engagement is
limited, this paper integrates most of the present theory into an extensive background and
problem discussion. Additionally, since there is a lack of research concerning this concept
and some papers reinforced the idea that a hybrid workplace could have an impact on
engagement, this helped us to have a clearer purpose for this study.

Following the perspective of Charmaz (2006), before the data collection process,
literature concerning hybrid workplaces was explored to have a better grasp and
understanding of this concept. The theory presented in our background and problem
formulation follows an integrative approach as stated by Hannah Snyder (2019), this
enables the selection of sources to have wider flexibility. Consequently, as an example,
certain newspaper articles, and books could potentially add insights and value to our
research paper input in case no other theory was found from more traditional academic
origin literature. Thus, our study complements the lack of literature concerning our topic
by using secondary sources such as newspapers and other less traditional sources. Finally,
and to further reason the selection of sources we are analysing for our paper, the response
to the Covid-19 pandemic and the ongoing change it has towards how work is being
conducted is evolving as we are writing this paper. Therefore, the use of the latest

18
statistics and findings related to remote working, hybrid setup, and employee
engagement, will enable us to present an outcome that is not rigidly based on academic
papers about remote work and engagement, written solely during the pandemic but also
covers the timeframe of post-pandemic and therefore, provides practical takeaways
around this topic, independent from the pandemic. The integrative approach is useful for
the relationship between hybrid workplace and engagement since it combines different
perspectives from literature to advance knowledge (Torraco, 2005; Snyder, 2019).
Additionally, this approach would fit perfectly with our constructivism grounded theory
view followed by Charmaz, as the concept of engagement and hybrid workplace needs
further theory (Sophie & Pierres-Yves, 2021), allowing the creation of initial
conceptualizations and theoretical models (Snyder, 2019).

The selection of the articles was made through the search engines ‘Primo’, ‘Web of
science’ and ‘Scopus’. During the selection process, we limited articles that were in
English language, peer-reviewed articles, or articles relevant to our research. When
searching for articles, we did not follow any ranking criteria as we judged ourselves if the
paper was relevant for our research. Additionally, as we follow an integrative approach,
the sources selected were flexible. As an example, we used newspaper articles and
conference papers to complement the lack of literature. Through the search engines the
following keywords were used: “Remote work and engagement; Hybrid workplace”;
“Hybrid work”; “Pandemic and workplace and engagement”; “Work and Post-Pandemic
and Engagement”; “Hybrid work and Post Pandemic”; “Remote and Hybrid Work.” The
results were narrowed down after reading the abstract, discussion, and conclusion which
enabled us to evaluate the relevance of the papers. Furthermore, a snowball effect was
used through relevant articles to find additional sources and increase the amount of
information for our literature review.

2.5 Research Methods

In line with the social constructionist epistemology, the objective to establish knowledge
that enables to answer the research question, and the ability to facilitate in-depth
interpretations, required closeness and openness with the source of information. Based on
inductive research design, and in order to answer the RQ, reasoned for inductively finding
primary data by allocating informants who would be willing to share their knowledge and
experience on the topic. Therefore, to start our study, our first step was to identify relevant

19
informants and conduct semi-structured interviews, facilitating the collection of sufficient
volume of data. Easterby-Smith et al. (2018) highlights the methods and techniques for
the research process as fundamental conditions for achieving high-quality research.
Equally, each element of the research design should derive from the research question
and be consistent with the research philosophy (Saunders et al. 2019). Selecting Grounded
Theory interpretive approach, which allows the researcher to analyse the data in the
middle of the collection process (Saunders et al., 2019), provided a good fit for exploring
the relation between variables our study i.e., hybrid workplace and employee
engagement.

The following sub-chapters, namely Data Construction, Selection of Informants, and

Interview Design, will elaborate in a greater detail on how each respective element of the
Research Design was managed in the light of achieving the answer to the RQ.

2.5.1 Data Construction

With social constructionism as epistemology, the importance lies in understanding how
people make sense of their experiences (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). Therefore, with
“social reality” being determined by people instead of objective and external factors
(Easterby-Smith et al., 2018), it was critical to identify the informants who have the
relevant experience and knowledge to answer the RQ. Thereafter, the data was collected
via semi-structured interviews, allowing flexible interpretation in the later stage. Less
prescriptive and more interactive GT approach is a key viewpoint by Charmaz (2006), as
it is still focusing on the outcome while having some freedom. Also, the latter further
emphasizes the openness of the construction of theory. In this light, open-ended questions
during the interviews served as an optimal approach to collect the data and build a
foundation for the data construction process.

It was acknowledged during this study writing process that, taken the constructionist
nature of this paper, researchers’ view and voice of the authors should be heard (Easterby-
Smith et al., 2018) through the interviews and later interpretation process of the collected
data. Similarly, literature review played a different role in our research, compared to the
positivist approach, with the existing theories critically assessed to understand what has
been done and what has been left out of sight (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018), recognizing
what is the new knowledge our paper can contribute with.

20
2.5.2 Selection of Informants
In order to answer the RQ, informants had to have the HW experience. To gain an
understanding of individual contributors’ and managers’ perspectives, both groups were
included among the informants. Managers, in the context of this paper, have a team
reporting to them. Therefore, managers were able to share both their personal and
manager role-related aspects concerning HW and EE. Considering the nature of work,
defining whether remote and hybrid working are feasible (Halford, 2005), we contacted
white-collar employees since ICT devices enable this group of people to conduct their
tasks from home. We did not limit the sample from geographic location, industry, or size
of the company, nor the seniority of the informants’ point of view, conforming with the
non-probability sampling approach where the selected sample is to enable making
generalisations to theory rather than population (Saunders et al. 2019). Details about the
informants, including information on what their current workplace setup is like, are
described in Table 2 below.

Considering the recent pandemic, it required little effort to allocate informants from
within our own network who have had the RW and HW exposure and who were willing
to share their insights, specifically with focus on the hybrid model and its impact on
employee engagement.

Most of the informants were contacted via LinkedIn, a social media platform for
professionals, and remaining ones via e-mail. Up to one-hour Teams or Zoom calls were
scheduled with 12 participants.

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 Table 2.1Informants Overview

From the Table 2 we can see that all informants have some type of hybrid workplace
established, and most of them are managers. After conducting interviews (see chapter
2.5.3) with each of them, we reached a certain point of saturation where categories
became well developed and further data collection would hardly have revealed new
findings (Saunders et al. 2019). The latter process contributed to increasing the
trustworthiness of this research (see chapter 2.7).

2.5.3 Interview Design

To collect the qualitative data aiming to shed a light on a connection between employee
engagement and the hybrid workplace model, we chose the semi-structured interview
approach which allowed us to deep dive into the topic and left room also for a wider
discussion where the interviewees had the chance to freely express their thoughts on the
subject. This means, and especially in the context where HW is a rather new phenomena
for most of the interviewees, we ensured to cover themes we prepared prior to the
interviews but equally left room for a wider reasoning and background to understand
detailed nuances behind the statements from informants. Understanding the constructs
the informant uses, allows to interpret the opinion and beliefs formulated in relation to a
specific matter (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). Therefore, semi-structured interviews
presented a well-suited technique to unlock these constructs. The pre-prepared

22
questionnaire was combined with further follow-up questions and new insights, which
raised either during the interview or as reflections from previous interviews. As per
Saunders et al., (2019), where explaining the semi-structured interview process, our
interviews started with a predetermined list of themes coupled with some main questions.
The themes comprised of questions setting the scene by understanding the workplace
status at INTs’ organization currently and defining the main variables of this research,
followed by exploring the relationships INTs saw between those variables, and eventually
have future looking perspective when asking informants to describe the future setups in
which HW could affect EE positively.

Considering the inductive nature of the qualitative research (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018)
open-ended questions were asked from the research participants. Also, the entire
interaction was recorded for transcript and interpretation purposes. Laddering, technique
was used to get more out of a question (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). This meant that
often the informant was asked to provide an example or illustrate his/her previous
statement in more detail. At the end of most of the interviews and where time allowed,
participants were allowed to express their thoughts about the research topic, and what
they felt was relevant but not covered by our questions. Consequently, some of those new
topics became part of the pre-prepared questions during the following interviews.

The interviews took place between 4. and 18. of March 2022. Most of the interviews were
carried out virtually, either via Zoom or Microsoft Teams, with cameras turned on,
enabling to make a note of the research participants’ non-verbal expressions. One
interview was conducted in a hybrid setting with one researcher connected via Zoom
while the informant and the second researcher meeting face-to-face. All interviews were
in English and included both researchers, with one leading the conversation and the other
one taking notes and asking additional questions. Having two researchers presented in all
interviews and later interpretations allowed us to avoid potential risk for bias from the
interviewer imposing their own reference frames on the interviewees (Easterby-Smith et
al., 2018). After each interview, reflection coupled with discussion took place between
the researchers to compare the received input against previous data, sometimes resulting
in modifying the questions for the following interviews.

23
The process of how the pre-prepared interview questions, and consequently emphasis on
certain themes, gradually evolved throughout the 12 interviews is shown in Appendix 2.

2.6 Data Analysis

Throughout interviews, when writing transcripts and conducting coding, notes were taken
and important statements circled, following the memo-writing technique which highlights
the importance of researchers reflecting on the emerging ideas (Easterby-Smith et al.,
2018). Certain repetitions and core themes were custom to most of the interviews we
conducted. While many highlighted the importance of leadership in the HW setting,
others stressed the critical role of communication and routine every employee should
adhere to – similar remarks were taken note of and often used as themes during the
following interviews. As an example, when regular employee satisfaction and
engagement survey was brought up during one of the interviews, it served as one of the
key questions in the next interviews. As a result, employee survey got also prominent
position in the coding process since was perceived as a relevant matter by most of the
informants.

The fact that data collection and data analysis are interrelated in qualitative research
(Saunders et al., 2019) was explicit in this study, especially when using the Charmaz
constructionist GA approach. The interview transcripts went through the process of
contrasting the newly collected data against input from prior interviews, triggering new
codes and expanding the overall data set. The latter is termed as constant comparison and
ensures consistency in the coding and analysis process (Saunders et al., 2019). The first
evaluation of the collected material, where categorizing the data units on a high-level and
partly even irrelevant ones, resulted in similar statements being labelled with the same
code. Thereafter, further consolidation of similar codes and shortlisting of only the most
relevant ones with the potential to answer the RQ concluded in 25 codes, 12 sub-
categories and 6 categories. This described process follows the logic of initial and focused
coding approach (Saunders et al., 2019). Analysing the data, evaluating the updated
coding, respective sub-categories and categories was not a linear process but rather
reminded a journey with several detours, ultimately reaching the destination. The codes-
to-theory Saldaña’s (2015) coding tree is visualized in Chapter 3 (Tables 3.1 and 3.2).

24
2.7 Research Quality
Quality assurance, as an important aspect of research, is a crucial factor that influences
the credibility of the study, nevertheless, it is hard to know if the quality is ensured, what
can be done is to reduce the possibility of getting the answer wrong (Saunders et al.,
2019). Positivist and interpretivist researchers use different methods to ensure the quality
of their studies (Saunders et al., 2019). On the one side, positivists will focus on the
reliability and validity of their research whereas interpretivists will either adapt those
terms to their study or judge them as inappropriate for their quality criteria (Guba and
Lincoln, 1989). Additionally, rigidly forcing these concepts would go against the core
values of qualitative research and shows the difficulty of demonstrating the high quality
and credibility of a qualitative study (Saunders et al., 2019). Therefore, while terms
verification and falsification are associated with the positivist view, validating whether
the assumptions or hypotheses are correct or incorrect (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018), is
equally relevant for constructionist research to safeguard reliability of the outcome. The
latter can be achieved through ensuring fulfilling of the criteria of validity, by including
a sufficient number of perspectives, reliability by other observers reaching similar
observations, and finally generalizability by allowing applying the outcome in other
contexts (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018).

To reach the quality of our paper, we decided to follow four major categories about
trustworthiness followed by Guba (1981): credibility, transferability, confirmability, and
dependability.

Credibility refers to the evaluation of the truthfulness of the findings during the study in
its context (Guba, 1981). To ensure the application of this criterion we took different
perspectives on the findings. Additionally, our interviews were always conducted in pairs,
one of us was in charge of conducting the main questions and the other one was asking
sub-questions as well as overseeing the interview to avoid any bias. Also, we compared
our findings with the existing literature to validate our results. Collecting data from 12
participants, to achieve a sufficient volume of viewpoints which would contribute to
further credibility of the findings and later analysis, aligns with triangulation approach
which aims for increased confidence in the observations’ accuracy through interpretation
of multiple perspectives (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). Recurrent patterns from the data
collection process were used to build the theory grounded in the data.

25
Transferability, as a criterion, follows the idea that findings should be applicable and
relevant in any context or with other informants, creating context-free truth statements
(Guba, 1981). As mentioned before, we conducted twelve semi-structured interviews
with employees and managers coming from diverse backgrounds and companies, hence,
further fortifying our transferability. Furthermore, during the interviews, we asked
descriptive questions concerning the subject’s background, which will be further
developed in our findings. Thus, this would enable us to create thick descriptions (Guba,
1981) which would help other researchers to have a better idea of the context.

Dependability requires that findings should be stable for them to be meaningful as they
should be replicable if put in the same situation (Guba, 1981). To have stable findings, as
mentioned before we both conducted the interviews to have a better grasp of the key
outcomes that were found. Additionally, we compared the different codes found with one
another, further increasing the consistency of our findings.

Lastly, confirmability is commonly described as the objectivity of the findings and should
solely be based on the subjects’ insights to avoid bias (Guba, 1981). To reach the
confirmability aimed, the methods and methodology used for our research were explained
thoroughly in the research method section, as mentioned by Guba, (1981, p. 81),
‘Objectivity is presumably guaranteed by methodology; If the methods are explicated,
open to public scrutiny’.

2.8 Ethical Implications

It is essential to protect the interests of the research subject and research community
(Easterby-Smith et al., 2018), a way to achieve this is through following the ten ethical
principles established by Bell and Bryman (2007). Participation consent form, as shown
in Appendix 3, was provided to the research participants before the interviews and carried
the role of ensuring compliance to the GDPR requirements as well as adhering to the fully
informed consent, anonymity, privacy and confidentiality principles as laid out by Bell
and Bryman (2007). In parallel, we did our utmost to apply all other principles of Bell
and Bryman (2007) throughout this study: no harm to participants, respect dignity,
avoiding deception, declaration of conflict of interests, honesty and transparency, and
finally avoidance of misleading or false reporting.

26
3. Empirical Findings, Interpretation and Discussion
______________________________________________________________________

Chapter 3 sub-chapters follow the structure of the coding process, meaning that
categories comprise the first tier of sub-chapters, followed by sub-categories and codes.
The first category and respectively the first sub-chapter, i.e., 3.1 Distinguish HW From
Extensive RW, is providing clarification and definitions for remote work (RW) and hybrid
work (HW). Thereafter, to understand the background and context around HW, the 3.2 is
called Reasons Behind HW Becoming Widely Accepted. The most extensive sub-chapter,
i.e., 3.3 Factors Affecting HW Experience, describes how the design and implementation
of the HW setup can influence employee engagement (EE). Thereafter, HW conditions,
impacting EE either indirectly or directly, respectively 3.4 HW Conditions with Potential
Negative Influence, 3.5 HW Conditions with Negative Influence, and finally 3.6 Positive
Aspects of HW.

Gradually, and through the analysis in different sections of this chapter, a model
reflecting the emerging theory is constructed. The conclusion of the findings chapter,
summarizing the theory and the model visualizing it, is presented in sub-chapter 3.7.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The collected data was analysed by using the grounded analysis (GA) approach
(Easterby-Smith et al., 2018), meaning the statements from the informants were
categorized into codes, sub-categories, and categories. Codes stand for a short phrase
which summarizes the meaning of a piece of data such as sentence from an informant
(Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). Eventually, the themes that rose from the coding exercise
contributed to generating the theory, explaining the implications hybrid work (HW) has
on employee engagement (EE) and thereby answering our research question (RQ). The
collected data carries a critical function in developing the theory. Hence, the literature
references in this interpretation chapter serve merely the role of positioning this research
established theory in relation to existing and published theories without the latter
interfering the process of coding and theory creation, as per Saunders et al. (2019). Coding
stages description, showing how 25 focused codes became 12 sub-categories and
eventually 6 categories, is illustrated in the Table 3.1 and Table 3.2, following the
Saldaña’s (2015) “codes-to-theory” example. Additionally, the Table 3.1 and Table 3.2
include statements from the informants, exemplifying the input and the logic behind the
codes that emerged.

27
Table 3.1 Codes-to-theory Model, Part 1

28
Table 3.22 Codes-to-theory Model, Part 2

29
3.1 Distinguish Hybrid Work from Extensive Remote Work
A distinction between hybrid work (HW) and extensive remote work (RW) can be drawn
as they have some key differences and similarities concerning the freedom of choice of
the employees. In this section, our interviewees/informants are referred to by the
abbreviation ‘INT’.

3.1.1 Extensive Remote Work Characteristics

A general definition can be drawn from the insights gathered in the interview process.
Extensive RW was characterized by not being tied to a geographical place, INT2 “I would
say that remote is not where you belong to a specific office, it's not geographical, you're
not tied to geographical place”. Additionally, several interviewees mentioned that RW is
working from a distance, following the idea of geographical freedom, as a choice can be
made by the worker on where to work, while still being limited in the possibility to work
in the office. In INT6 “Remote work is, it means that you are geographically in another
location. If that’s in your home, or in another office it’s, remote is remote in term on not
being on the original workplace”. These findings are very similar to the general definition
of RW found by other researchers such as Yang et al., (2021) and Lunde et al., (2022).
Besides that, one interviewee mentioned the possibility of going back to the office but on
rare occasions, doing most of the work from home, INT9 “remote will be entirely from
home unless there’s absolutely sort of let’s see a handful of occasions when you need to
physically be an office otherwise you do the bulk of your work at home” which widens up
the definition of extensive RW as it can be seen differently in function of the informant.
The pandemic and extensive usage of RW showed that everything could be done from
home (INT7). From the findings, we can deduce that extensive RW comes with a certain
freedom in work locations while excluding the option to go back to the office.

3.1.2 Hybrid Work Characteristics

In contrast, HW characteristics were presented as “where you work your best” (INT2).
Most of the informants mentioned that the concept of hybrid is about the possibility for
employees to work partly from home and partly in the office while giving workers the
flexibility of choice in their work location which adds another layer of freedom compared
to extensive RW. This is illustrated by INT3 “Hybrid working would mean that you have
a working strategy where you are working partly from office and partly from home”,
INT6 “Hybrid workplace it’s like a mix of remote work and on-site work where you kind

30
of have possibility to combine both, on-site from a regular office or from somewhere else”
and INT7 “it could be making your own choice”. In the literature, the concept of hybrid
work refers to a combination of working from home and the office (Babapour Chafi et
al., 2021; Halford, 2005; Moglia et al., 2021) which validates our findings about hybrid
workplace. Furthermore, the nature of what is called the workplace has drastically
changed as it is not only question to work from home or the office but also any other
location which depends on the employee's decision “That flexibility could be from
wherever basically home, could be from colocation places or wherever” (INT5). This
finding is in phase with Halford (2005), as a multiple location workplace connected via
ICTs.

The purpose of the office seems to have changed from the results gathered, as decisions
should be made in accordance to meet the team, managers, or stakeholders as it would
bring further value to the office place as implied by INT3, “it’s very much up to each
employee themselves, together with their manager, to decide when they spend time at
work and when they work from home”, INT4 “they also see the value of being in the office
and meet team and stakeholders”, and INT5 “so in acceptance with their stakeholder’s /
managers then they can have flexible operating hours and flexible operating locations”.
This change of purpose of the office was further emphasized during the interviews but
will be mentioned at a later stage of the results.

In some instances, HW could be characterized by a certain number of days in the office,

as mentioned by INT7, “someone in my team it would be you’re expected to be in the
office three days a week” or by Golden (2006) and Gajendran and Harrison (2007) which
advise having 2 to 2.5 days remote per week to increase employee satisfaction. But the
concept of hybrid is not as straightforward and is considered by some interviewees as
“quite loose” (INT9). It is further justified by other results, which show that a day could
be divided in a hybrid way, enabling employees to go to the office and giving them the
flexibility to work remotely when needed, INT8 “It's more normal now to see some
leaving at 14:00 and take the last meeting at home than it was in the old days.” To add
upon that argument, informants can have a different view of what is a hybrid setup as
there is no true definition and guidelines on the frequency of being on-site and working
remotely.

31
In conclusion, the findings show that HW is often described as a flexible solution
giving employees the choice in their work location, either at the more traditional
workplace the office, or the less conventional home office. This idea of choice is
mentioned when using a hybrid format by Badapour Chafi et al., (2021) and
Halford, (2005), which leads to a more effective workplace since employees can
choose the best location in function of their tasks. A certain number of days was
mentioned in some instances whereas for other informants the full flexibility of the
number of days was mentioned to best describe HW, this demonstrates the different
views about the concept of a hybrid workplace and is further explored in the findings
section.

3.2 Reasons Behind Hybrid Work Becoming Widely Accepted

From the findings, all the informants accepted the change towards RW and HW setup.
This part describes what conditions enabled this acceptance. Change in perspective is
driven by 4 core reasons. Namely change of mindset, technology, upsides for the
company, and lastly Covid-19 pandemic and adaptability. These reasons are illustrated in
Figure 1 below and are further analysed in the following sub-chapters.

Figure 1. Reasons behind HW becoming widely accepted

3.2.1 Change in Perspective

As shown in the chapter 3.2 figure, change in the perspective of the decision-makers and
employees was formed primarily by two core factors i.e., Covid-19 pandemic enforced
RW experience and overall mindset change. The following sub-chapters analyse further
those two aspects.

3.2.1.1 Change of Mindset

At the start of the pandemic “there was a lot of uncertainty” (INT2) as the impact of
extensive RW on employees. It was further accentuated by the fact that a certain feeling
of being on your own emerged at an earlier stage of the implementation of RW, “Then
the reality came, I am alone here, how will this go” (INT4). This change in working setups

32
was often connotated with negative aspects on employees in general, while still extensive
RW had some downsides, as stated in INT3 “Engagement went down a little but not to a
large extent” there were rather limited, as seen in INT2 “Didn’t see so much negative
comments” and INT5 “When did this in Q4 2020 was score out of 100 was 88. The four
quarters of 2021 the score was 89, 88, 89, 89 respectively. So, the engagement score has
been quite steady”. Throughout the interview process more positive aspects were
mentioned especially at the start of the implementation of RW, INT4 “First reaction is,
oh great, I can work from home, this is fantastic” and this period is often mentioned as
well-managed, INT3 “Most people managed it well to be honest”.

3.2.1.2 COVID-19 Pandemic and Adaptability

RW existed before COVID-19 as stated in INT1 “RW has always taken place”, the
Pandemic and regulations put in place accelerated and forced its implementation. Due to
the forced nature of the implementation of RW, and the lack of options for employees, a
change of perception can be noticed amongst employees and managers as quoted in INT1
“The other driver is a change in mindset, mindset of employees but even more importantly
mindset of managers and we have seen as I said before a tremendous journey when it
comes to mindset shift”. Additionally, the forced nature of RW as well as companies and
employees that were able to experience RW allowed the emergence of the hybrid model
and its implementation, as mentioned in INT2 “I think that pandemic helped us, I think
it’s almost like the pandemic was an enabler for us to really speed up our way of looking
at RW and hybrid working models”. From the literature, it can be noticed a clear
preference from employees for a hybrid setup, as seen by Teevan et al., (2021), and
Caminiti, (2021). During the pandemic, from the informants, an acceptance and a growing
incentive for the usage of RW and HW can be noticed. This change was not as smooth
for everyone, some employees adapted quite easily to the situation as mentioned in INT10
“It was fantastic to see how you know we adapted so quickly and it’s not only me it’s you
know everybody”, whereas others had a tough time to accept the change. It can be
explained by the fact, that employees were so used to working in the office, having little
to no experience in an RW environment, as is the case with INT3 “I mean I’ve been
working 20 years every day in the office, so it was difficult to start working from home”.
This change impacted even more so managers that had to change their ways of working
and had to give more autonomy to their team members. A minority of managers were still

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trying to micromanage employees at the start of the pandemic as stated in INT1 “In the
very beginning we had managers scrambling for control, in the old fashion way. Now you
had to operate in different way”. This change in the mindset of managers and overall
leadership in the company is further emphasized by INT7 “We introduced results only
work environment. This meant we're not controlling work times anymore. We simply focus
on the outcome”. Overall employees adapted easily to a RW model, INT9 mentions “the
first point was how people adapted to using the conferencing apps, there was that
everything was working quite quickly” not only did they adapt to the environment but
also employees increased their skillset to thrive in an RW setup “I saw almost
instantaneous change in people’s skills”. This fast adaptability and increased skillset by
workers can be explained by the fact that it became a requirement since they were forced
to change “I need to know because I’ve been forced to do it” (INT9). Additionally, INT10
further strengthens that argument of adaptability with the quote “it was fantastic to see
how you know we adapted so quickly and it’s not only me it’s you know everybody”.

Most of the informants highlight the positive correlation that this change brought in their
professional life as it allowed them to discover a new way of working and changed old
habits, INT8, “I was also, you could say, from the old school before that you know your
computer is at work. I think Corona was good in the way that it turned that upside down”.
Lastly, INT9, brought an interesting point where the interviewee felt closer to his team
due to mutual care from his co-workers and himself, trying to look out for each other that
emerge from working remotely “Having teams in the virtual mode, I feel closer to my
team and that’s a really unusual thing to say. I mean more like we were really trying to
look out for each other, is everybody OK?”. This change in behaviour from employees
follows the idea of mindset change which the extensive RW usage enabled and created
new rules amongst employees.

3.2.1.3 Technology
An important factor that was aborded from our informants was the technology factor,
which was described as an enabler for the participants to have a successful and a better
HW experience. Indeed, INT3 states “What we got is a proper computer screen…, and
that makes a difference”, INT4 “I think to have a good equipment is critical because
working remotely means that you are basically sitting with meetings 90% of your time”,
and INT8 “Everyone was given an opportunity to get good furniture from the office or a

34
voucher to buy something yourself”. Similarly, Greer & Payne, (2014), state the
importance when working remotely of having adequate technological equipment and
advice companies to provide them to recreate the resources and the company worksite.
From the literature and the findings, we can see the importance of supporting employees
with proper equipment to enable “full speed when working” as mentioned in INT8. INT7
went as far as investing in technology to recreate a feeling of being in the office for
employees that could not attend the meeting physically “We invested in technology, and
we have a meeting owl, ... So, it gives the feeling and the impression where six people are
attending from one room and other six people attend from somewhere else”. Investing in
technology could potentially overcome certain key issues that a hybrid setup could pose
and is a lead that could be explored in future research. Some grounded rules have emerged
from working remotely when conducting meetings, for instance INT4 states “it is
important to you that, when you are taking the virtual meetings, that the camera would
be on” or INT12 mentions a similar rule that “We also had rules within my team to always
have camera on, try to put up different things during meetings to have a non-meeting”.

3.2.1.4 Upside for the Company

Implementing HW comes with several upsides for companies and managers which in turn
increase the willingness to adopt this type of setup. The interviewees brought up many
upsides for the company concerning HW, such as the flexibility in locations that has a
direct impact on talent acquisition, illustrated by this quote in INT2 “We can source
talents very different from how it’s been done before, you can actually have people sitting
on different locations with this skillset or the mindset that we are looking for”. It can be
understood that this flexibility opens a lot of options for the recruitment since employees
do not need to be in a specific location to perform their tasks. HW has the advantage to
combine both worlds, giving access to working on-site and from home. Having the
opportunity to meet physically with stakeholders or teams is a key upside in a hybrid
setup as it is often characterized as more efficient, as seen in INT11 “In other words, my
consultant physically at my customer are solving lot more issues, and quicker, than
remotely”. On the other side, having the option to work from home for certain individuals
might be an advantage efficiency-wise, as some employees perform better by using RW
depending on the task or the field of work which follows the idea of task-related
workplace of Halford, (2005). In INT11, it was mentioned that in the field of IT one

35
employee would perform more efficiently when working remotely. This idea of
combination of the advantages of working on-site and from home when working in a
hybrid setup can also be seen in the literature, as it mentions that it combines the best of
both worlds (Babapour Chafi et al., 2021; Moglia et al., 2021)

The engagement has been an important aspect that was aborded during the interviews
which has a direct impact on customer satisfaction “Customers really come back to us
and say, well this is the kind of service I've never had before, this is unexpected you do
need extra mile and those things” (INT7). INTs have a willingness to increase this
engagement “And I worked a lot to create some kind of sense raising the engagement or
at least their motivation because when your motivated your automatically, your motivated
to do good” (INT6). All in all, the upsides mentioned above have a direct impact on the
willingness of employers and employees to adopt an HW setup.

3.3 Factors Affecting Hybrid Work Experience

What became evident based on the answers from the interviews is that HW experience,
and its potential impact on employee engagement, depends largely on a variety of factors
around how the HW is designed, implemented, and governed. Hence, the setup of RW
defines how it potentially influences employee engagement, motivation and other
employee satisfaction related metrics. In the following sub-sections, and as visualized in
the Figure 2 below, we are elaborating on those factors in more detail.

Figure 2. Factors Affecting Hybrid Work Experience

3.3.1 Successful Hybrid Work Pre-requisites

The data, collected during the interviews, revealed the list of pre-requisites the informants
emphasized as factors playing an important role if the organization wants to succeed with
the HW. Success in this context means HW contributing to motivated and engaged
employees who are willing to go the extra mile, helping the company to achieve its goals.

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3.3.1.1 Hybrid Work Design
According to data, collected during the interviews, the to-be implemented HW
configuration plays an important role if the organization aims for having an engaged
workforce. Most of the companies, represented by informants we spoke to, are in the
middle of designing their HW approach, considering the short restriction-free period since
the pandemic. Few participants mentioned exploring the different HW options based on
feedback from the employees and insights from other organizations, regarding the pros
and cons specific HW configuration might pose. As an example, and in the context where
people are mainly still working from home but invited to return to office without any firm
demands from the employer, INT4 stated “I think they (author: management) are waiting
a bit to see the reactions…, and what is the industry standard…, I asked my manager
couple of weeks ago, he didn’t really know either, I’m sure I need to take some decisions
about it soon”. What revealed from the interviews, either directly or indirectly explained
as the trigger for the HW support, is the desire to avoid extremes due to various reasons
as per INT8 “the top management is leaving it a little bit up to each team but that there
can be no extremes so it's not OK to be from home all the time but it's also not ok to be in
the office all the time because we do not have enough space”. This shows that additionally
to various employee satisfaction factors, companies are often forced to opt for HW
solution due to physical space shortages in the offices.

The input from interviews revealed existing setups varying from complete flexibility,
meaning no mandatory division between the days worked from home- vs corporate office,
to several companies having defined number of days per week in office requirement
established, similarly as advised by Golden, (2006). Some aspects of the HW setup can
vary from country to country, to meet different labour laws in a specific country, whereas
the general theme being that modus operandi should serve the purpose. The INT4 said “I
want to intervene as little as possible because one person can say that he/she wants to be
in the office 100% - fine, another may say that he/she wants to work from home 5 days a
week, so how do I handle that? I would engage my team members through some sort of
hybrid model, hopefully enabling different solutions with different team members”. INT5
says that “the question is not about three days or two days (author: home vs office), the
question is about being effective, being engaged towards delivering the objectives and
the strategy that the companies is after”. This answer conveys the general view most of
the participants had, meaning structure is needed but should not be a requirement for the

37
requirement’s sake but rather designed in a way it enhances EE and enables company to
achieve its targets.

Most of the informants highlight the importance for the structure of the HW, or at least
details of the approach, to be agreed upon between the manager and the team. As INT10
puts it “as a manager, you need to be very open minded, listen how employees want to
have it…, is it that manageable depending on what we are doing? What kind of task we
have, roles, responsibility? I had this kind of open mind dialogue with our team”. This
shows that a manager’s ability to validate the individuals in the team, the tasks they
conduct, and what is reasonable from company perspective, is crucial to reach an optimal
solution. Several responses explain the need for location (author: home vs office) to fit
the task’s nature and purpose. This aligns with Halford, (2005), as the hybrid workplace
gives the option for employees to actively choose their work setup. Halford, (2005),
divides tasks in a hybrid workplace into two streams, an office one and a home stream,
the home stream is more characterised by routine tasks, where the peace and quiet
environment limits outside distractions which is beneficial for certain tasks. This is well
illustrated by the quote of INT1 “part of the old activities can be done from other
locations. For example, a task that you need to concentrate on an excel sheet can be done
from another location so some of those activities will move out of the office”. The nature
of tasks when working remotely varied in function of the informant as each one had a
unique way of working. INT3 finds it “difficult, when not being in the office, when you
have meetings e.g., when you have bigger meetings with lot of stakeholders…, you don’t
really see the expression of peoples’ faces…, when I do presentation on Teams
(Microsoft), I lose all the other people. And that’s a problem because you don’t really
see…, here is someone who wants to ask a question – these are the kind of things you
miss”. Stanaert et al., (2021), provides details about the importance of different meeting
modes in function of the objectives of the meeting. Following the quote of INT3
mentioned above, Stanaert et al., (2021), states the importance of face-to-face for
interpersonal relationships, which can be extended to stakeholder relationship in the
instance of INT3. This can be explained by several factors such as body language,
discerning facial expressions, being in the same physical location, and observe
participants as stated by Stanaert et al., (2021). On other hand, INT4 highlights the
possibility of being able to “replace big part of the meetings” in the HW setup. Those
statements refer to the need for deciding on a location that suits the activity. INT6 explains

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this as “some things are easier to do when you are by yourself, you do it much better when
you’re not disturbed” which aligns with Halford, (2005), task stream view.

One of the main HW elements highlighted by most of the informants is the coordination
around when the team has common meetings and gatherings, enabling f-to-f interaction.
According to INT6 “the hybrid model is the best because you can get the best from two
worlds…, you just have to structure and coordinate it, otherwise if they (author: team
members) come all different days you don’t get the synergy”.

The general view informants convey is that HW design should meet the purpose of the
tasks and company goals, provide flexibility, and build culture. The latter is perhaps best
captured in the INT7 response, representing a company which has exercised RW and HW
since 2008, when saying “Bring all the team together without making some rules. Give
the people the freedom, the flexibility and the power about their time and simply ask them
what they need to do, show the vision and then the people definitely will go with you”.
This type of empowerment, including granting autonomy to employees, aligns with
similar characteristics and outcome as what EE definition includes.

3.3.1.2 Individual Approach

One of the areas, indirectly related also to HW design and HW implementation, is the
tactics managers should have towards individuals different by nature i.e., introverts or
extraverts. The desire to understand this from a HW perspective is to do with whether
customizing or not the HW approach per person will potentially influence those
individuals’ work engagement.

The overall conclusion of the responses is that as a manager, one should accept having
different types of people in the team, contributing to the diversity aspect, and without
one-size-fits-all strategy find ways to include every member of the team through regular
on-site gatherings and other social events. INT1 highlights the risk where although
introverts are going inwards to source their energy and might therefore find it feasible to
work extensively remote, versus extraverts who use various interactions with their
colleagues to get energy, introverts might in long run become so-called satellites with risk
of being disconnected from rest of the team. Similarly, and as INT4 formulates it “one
problem can be that you have one person that is little bit more introvert and would like
to stay at home, but I know that this person should be in the office more, both for this
person him-/herself or in order to practice more networking, otherwise you could end up

39
in silo-thinking”. Therefore, the answers in this matter emphasize the HW approach where
f-to-f interaction occurs regularly, be it with colleagues and stakeholders in the office or
enjoying non-work-related activity with team members outside of the office. Risk, when
not making an effort to include those different types of people into the team, can be two-
fold – first, less productivity for the organization; second, negative impact on the
employee’s well-being. INT8 acknowledges that “it is good to have different people in
the team, and my goal is not to turn anyone into something they are not, as manager, I
need to be better at catching whether the person has a bad day. I would give them a call
or write on Teams to follow-up – and all that (if someone is having a rough time) is much
easier when you see people in the office”. INT7 describes the approach in their company,
were using outside of office social gatherings to bring people together by “the events we
make are very different. So, there are people more of sport people and there are people
interested in art for example. This means, you have different groups and always some
overlaps and this enables us to bring all the team together”.

Additionally to a regular interaction, matching the tasks per individual becomes even
more relevant in the HW context according to the interview participants. INT6 says “it’s
like for the introvert people, when we have meetings, I would have them work on facts
and stuff, I would give different tasks…, and still they need to meet one-on-one…, and I
realised that they appreciate it”. INT3 said it would not be feasible to accommodate
individual approaches and has solved the interaction challenge with set days during the
week for the team to be in the office.

Facilitating individual differences, to a reasonable extent, through a variety of events and

matching tasks per individual, contributes to establishing well-functioning team. INT10
uses a football team analogue when exemplifying:

“Building a football team…, you need to have a forward and midfielder, back goalie etc
and everybody cannot have the same kind of approach, mindset. I think it’s similar to
when we are building teams in companies, and I think it’s a big responsibility to the
managers. Maybe you are an introvert person…, you say that “I can work from home, I
always do it because you know I’m a little bit shy”, but maybe the best thing long term is
to see your colleagues and once a week or whatever you come out, you meet them”.

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INT12 highlights the importance of practice coming back to the office sometimes,
especially after extensive RW during the pandemic, to meet your colleagues “I think it
could be done as a practice, e.g., if you are an introvert and like working from home than
it might be difficult to return to the office again, so one should practice that”. The
importance of getting people to attend the f-to-f meetings and social gatherings is
according to some interviewees directly, and by others indirectly, tied to increasing EE
for example INT2 thinks “the engagement level would be high because it’s such a boost
to seeing each other”. Therefore, manager’s attention to different personalities within the
team and everyone’s participation in get-togethers is critical if one aims to have a positive
effect through HW on EE.

What can be found from the existing literature is that individual factors matter if the
company intends to enhance its employee’s engagement (Kwon and Park, 2019),
confirming the point of view most of our informants conveyed. At the same time, what
the future studies could research more in-depth, is the correlation between different
individuals’ characteristics and HW customization to maximize the engagement.

3.3.1.3 Hybrid Work Implementation

The way how HW is rolled-out is seen as an important factor for HW to function and
hence has either direct or indirect impact also on EE. Guidelines, communication, follow-
up, and other change management aspects form elements for an equation defining the
success of the HW implementation. Based on the interview answers, there is
overwhelming support for HW being the preferred approach in the future, yet there are
mixed opinions about the route towards an optimal solution and how it should be
configured.

Considering the short timeframe since the pandemic restrictions were lifted in most of the
countries in Europe, where our interviewees are from, the majority of the informants are
at the beginning of their journey in establishing more formal guidelines and policies
around HW. When asking about the necessity of a policy and guidelines, regulating the
decided HW setup, INT5 stated “the objectives for these documents or governing
mechanisms, in my world has been two things - one is to provide a structure and to have
some adherence, otherwise…, everyone is doing their own stuff. The important part is
what is the intent when you write such documents”. Similarly, INT4 clarifies that
“knowing the value of being visible for stakeholders and company, I would probably

41
support the guidelines based upon that and try to be as flexible as possible”. To second
to the theme of flexibility, INT7 who represents the company with 14 years of HW and
RW experience, highlights the importance of having “the less (author: rules) the better,
there should be some rules, but this is more common understanding rules”. Either way,
i.e. guidelines, policy with rules or none, it is important to be concrete and clear on what
is expected, as formulated by INT5 “our feeling is that if we are very broad and very
vague in our policies, that’s not an effective tool to manage people, it just creates more
concern and confusion”. Therefore, and independent from what is the preference
regarding the share of time employee should work from home vs office, most of the
informants lean towards having few concrete and purposeful guidelines in parallel with
facilitating flexibility.

Frequent communication from the manager, regular check-ins, and employee surveys are
perceived as a foundation to realize the preferred HW approach and gain the benefits,
including increased EE. According to INT5, their company “anticipates to bring in the
hybrid workplace policy sometime Q2’2022 and of course our engagement surveys will
continue”. This tactic follows similar practice many other informants refer to, meaning
rolling-out a certain approach and thereafter continuously following-up on it to
understand how it works and what is the impact on EE. As covered in the HW Design
chapter, the manager’s ability to assess the situation and whether certain team members
should come to the office more frequently is critical from the team and culture building
perspective, correlating with INT8 “feedback has been given to some that they could be
bit more often in the office…, who (author: are more senior)… otherwise manage their
work independently but since we are trying to build a team here with younger people in
the team who also have to have the opportunity to learn, therefore, some people have
been asked to come more often to the office”. In other words, if exercising HW starts to
conflict with other goals, the company or the team has, corrective actions should be
enforced.

To avoid resistance from the employees and consequently a drop in EE, when shifting to
HW from extensive RW, interview responses highlight the importance of flexibility. The
latter places further emphasis on HW design and implementation to avoid a negative
impact on EE.

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3.3.1.4 Hybrid Work Steady State
Some attributes, discussed in earlier 3.3 sub-chapters apply also during the HW steady
state phase. Therefore, will go over those briefly and rather focus on those topics not
covered before.

INT1 highlights the importance of discipline in the sense of planning and adhering to the
agreed approach, for example, “if we have a Teams meeting, we are all behind a screen”.
There are few interview responses referring to the risk of blurring the two, i.e., some
attendees on-site in the office vs the rest calling in from home, which can impact the entire
meeting experience negatively. INT1 exemplifies “if we start to blend the two, if you and
me were in the same room and another person connected via teams and if we were an
additional 5 people in the room, there is a risk that there is two meetings going on”.

Additionally, discipline touches upon maintaining structure and routines, as per INT2
“My feeling, and if I look at the survey result, is that we kept the level of engagement very
high, but we had very clear - Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning we always meet.
We started doing that very early, in the pandemic just to make sure that…, everybody had
some kind a structure to their day”. Combining those routines in the HW setup with f-to-
f interactions is what many see as a key lever to enhance EE, for example, INT5 says that
“there were many other business decisions…, and not everyone was aware of those
things…, maybe a better communication strategy might have helped. We were not sure…,
that was an area to be worked upon, that we thought was driving our engagement index
a little down but in parallel we thought that OK having them in those one-on-one face-
to-face discussions, workshop kind of modes will help to drive it better”. The importance
of frequent communication, routine and f-to-f was explained also from the perspective of
avoiding disconnection and employee well-being. INT6 elaborates “you get this feeling
of disconnected, so I was trying to do different strategies to go to the office at dedicated
times and then book some recurrent meetings when you meet in person…, I forced myself
to go physically to the office and I arranged some evenings when we went to have dinner
- that’s how I dealt with my own disengagement”. Alternatively, i.e., lack of routine, can
mean risk to employee’s health according to INT4 when exemplifying “if you wake up at
home and you have very negative spiral thinking and you feel alone, and you do not feel
engaged – I think it can go pretty quick until you get into very bad situation. If you don’t
have the systematic way to handle the day, you either should find those routines…, or you

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adjust and go back to office some days per week or weeks per month”. INT10 explains
that sub-ordinates have started to use the “do you have 5 minutes for me?” question more
frequently in the HW setup, which he believes is a sign of increased EE after HW with
three days in the office rule was introduced.

To face those new challenges RW and HW working environments pose, and to help with
creating routines, joint gatherings – both in the office and outside, and ultimately increase
EE, INT7 introduced a new position in their company called Feel-Well Manager and
describes the added value through this new person “organizing smaller events, some of
them online to give everyone a chance to participate. So, we went away from the big
company…, e.g., summer-days, and we reduced the team sizes and became more flexible
in organizing little events”. The idea of getting together in smaller groups is mentioned
also by INT8. Looking all the responses, high-level analysis shows many companies
having introduced mandatory meetings and workshops in the office or online, with a focus
on work-related topics, whereas fewer companies have established routines around team-
building and other social gatherings outside of the office.

Steady state phase keywords, many seen either directly or indirectly enhancing EE,
interviewees highlight the importance of maintaining discipline and routines for regular
team-meetings, including f-to-f communication through social gatherings.

3.3.2 Role of Leadership

This chapter covers two sub-chapters related to leadership role in creating HW
environment what would enhance EE, those two sub-chapters focus on change
management and communication.

3.3.2.1 Change Management

INT1 statement “in the very beginning (author: of the pandemic) we had managers
scrambling for control, in the old fashion way, now you had to operate in different way”
and INT2 “I think especially leaders and leadership maybe have been used to having little
bit more control…, it’s a struggle almost for them” showcase that the new modus operandi
requires leaders to re-think their role in the HW context. The leader’s ability to readjust
might lead to even greater EE according to INT2 because “when you empower your
team…, to be autonomous with time or tasks…, I only think it’s a benefit and it’s going
to be even more engaging for us going forward”. Similarly, INT12 concludes that “it

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should not be the leadership style where you decide if you need to be in the office or not,
the leadership were controlling what you are doing – this I think is the worse”. Less
control calls emphasis on trust, as explained by INT10 “important part going forward in
many companies (is) the trust between the managers and the employees, absolutely”.

INT7 uses emergency workers analogue to illustrate how leaders should work in the RW
and HW setting, to ensure that no one in the team is being ignored and it would be possible
to identify cases as described earlier where extensive RW might result with employee
becoming disconnected from rest of the team or, even worse, pose negative affect on
employee’s health. INT7 says that he

“Was being trained to be a rescue system in Germany, living next to a highway with 3
lines both sides, and sometimes mass accidents happened in this area because of fog.
When there are 40 - 80 cars crashing into each other, they trained us to behave in a way
people normally don't behave i.e. the biggest recommendation from them was to turn to
the people who don't cry because people who cry they have air and have power, but
people who don’t cry might be so seriously wounded that they need immediate help or
they are in shock which is also risk for their life. Managers are often not following those
simple rules and they listen to the loudest and…, my recommendation, is to ask how you
are doing, and let me see what you have done…, and so to engage with the introverts”.

To switch from control to trust-based leadership, and to enable leaders to identify

individuals who need extra support in the HW setting, requires learning and development.
INT2 says “how are we going to equip our leaders with this kind of broad mindset when
it comes to motivating and engaging people and have them feel recognized that’s going
to be a new set of skills…, for the majority of leaders that we have”. The need for
expanding leader’s knowledge is supported also by INT5 when stating that “the basic
knowledge, the basic approach or even the basic education for those managers needs to
grow or go to a different level and there are some mandatory trainings”.

3.3.2.2 Communication
Looking at all the interviews, the theme and central role of communication in various
settings is brought up repeatedly. Equally, communication has an important role in
leader’s contribution for making HW a positive experience and increase EE.

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The increased need for one-to-one meetings between the manager and subordinates is
brought up by many informants. INT4 explains “I set up one-to-one meetings…, I always
asked: “how are you doing?”, “you feel engaged?” …, I mean a bit more personal e.g.,
“are you overloaded or underloaded?” so they really understand I see them”. INT6
mentions feedback from colleagues i.e., “when we worked remote, they (employees) felt
that they didn’t have enough one-on-ones”. Some say they had on-to-one and team
meetings established earlier but partly from home-working environment demanded
adjustments into the frequency as per INT9 “I increased the one to ones we had to every
week instead of every two weeks, I increased the team meetings to every two weeks instead
of every month”. One-to-one meetings are positioned as an important tool in the
manager’s “toolbox”, similarly as regular employee surveys, enabling to understand the
status and whether something should be changed in the chosen approach.

3.3.3 Future Office

All participants said they currently have and intend to continue with the HW as the
preferred solution. The details of the approaches vary by company but overall, well
captured by INT1 who says that “the positive is that we can provide a better workplace
for individuals, balance in work-life and reduce travel. Optimal % of going back to the
office vs RW during the week depends on the activity; long periods (author: of RW) would
not benefit. Office in HW creates belonging”.

The following sub-chapters focus on areas of improvement for the HW experience in the
future, with some of the practices partly put in place already.

3.3.3.1 Purpose of the Office

INT2 sees the office, in the HW setup, as part of the “glue” holding the company together
as an organization. Likewise, all informants see the office playing a role even when the
future workplace evolves and HW setup becomes more mainstream, but the purpose of
the office changes compared to how it has been perceived in the past. INT7 says “the
office of the future - it's not a place to work its place to meet, a place to mingle, to share
ideas, simply to communicate - it's a place of communication much more than place to
work”. INT7 vision correlates with the topic of matching certain work tasks and activities
with the best suitable location, meaning use your home office when you have tasks that
demand focus and concentration, but company provided office for team building events,
workshops and brainstorming, and other meetings that would benefit from f-to-f

46
communication. INT3 says that “performance reviews for example are better to do face
to face”. Additionally, to meeting physically with your own team and department, several
participants are highlighting the cross-functional collaboration importance.

Alternative, where continue using office similarly as before the HW and without
synchronizing the times when co-workers are present, INT6 is convinced the office would
lose its meaning since “being on-site, it’s not just for you to come on-site, it’s to bring the
synergy; it's not about going to the office, just to go to the office, that’s stupid right,
relevance is lost”.

In short, future office purpose is to meet and interact and as per INT2 where the company
is “still trying to adjust the working habits”, same echoed from number of other
responses.

3.3.3.2 Functional Office

To meet the purpose, as described in the previous sub-chapter (i.e., 3.3.3.1), interview
participants are convinced that the design of how the offices are set up needs to change
in parallel. In other words, yesterday’s offices are not designed for the needs of tomorrow.
INT7 explains:

“We went to a new office space in 2017…, bought furniture for that office, if you ask me
today, I would do completely different setup style because there are a lot of reasons, for
example: we have some table where people could sit 6 people next to each other, to mingle
and talk but nowadays I have so many phone calls and conference calls that they need
more silent places than we actually have in the office. So…, if you as an employer force
them to come to work, you have to make sure that the office is set up for the new reality.
The new reality is that there will still be a lot of Teams meetings, calls…, many more than
before. I think a lot of work environments currently in the office don't fit to this new
reality”.

What can be derived from this last statement is that especially those organizations who
require their employees to work from an office in a mandatory setting, without necessarily
changing the purpose or tasks, are forced to rethink and make investments to facilitate
this parallel working concept. INT12, who goes to office only when she has the possibility
to interact with others, meaning her calendar is not full of meetings which she should take
online anyway because of different reasons e.g., attendees from other countries, says that:

47
“In the office we still have fixed places, I normally go around and try to find office area
where others are sitting, so I could be close to someone else; overall, the setup how we
sit in the office could be better because we are little bit coming back to the old setup. We
can sit more in an open landscape and meet other people at the same time”.

Thus, challenges related to office in the HW context arise when employees are expected
to return to office to exercise both interaction and other tasks in parallel, without the
employer having made the effort to facilitate this.

According to the data we collected from the interview answers, the future office demands
more shared working spaces (INT9), mingle areas (INT7), and meeting rooms for
workshops and team building events (INT2) as explained earlier. A wide selection of
silent small rooms is required (INT7) if the office is intended also for online meetings and
other tasks requiring focus and concentration. Maintaining the status quo, meaning not
making the necessary changes HW environment demands, can mount negative employee
experience, and consequently have negative impact on EE.

3.3.3.3 Social Gatherings

HW has several positive aspects according to informants, at the same time it reduces or
takes away completely the instant “fika” breaks and watercooler talks employees used to
have when working 9-5 in the office. To replace those interactions in the past, many are
stressing the importance of social events between the team members either in or outside
of the office to build the team, develop company culture and allow synergies between
team members. The latter are seen as EE impact factors.

Some of the activities, interviewees are describing, are related to attracting employees
back to the office after the pandemic restrictions were lifted, for example, INT1 says their
company did “simple things like open breakfast at the office, making sure that there are
social activities connected to the workplace”. At the same time, it serves as a good
example of what the future office could include, since most participants are convinced
that similar gatherings are critical in the future. Other examples, of the mentioned
activities, are minigolf (INT8), afterwork (INT11), art and sports related events (INT7).
Common theme is, find out what your team members like to do and, engage them in the
planning process and make routine out of those events because, and as explained by INT8:

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“Similar events play a bigger role now. With having different generations and different
roles within the team, whereas some team members are dependent on others, and they
really need to work together, for them to meet in a safe environment where it is not only
work-related topics that are discussed…, it is important that such engagement is built so
that people can collaborate”.

The importance of regularly bringing the team together to meet f-to-f, either in the office
or through social gatherings outside of the office, is underpinned by all interviewees as a
critical element for successful HW. INT7 summarizes the get-together need as:

“We have had the feeling that people are lost, that they feel alone at home, that their
motivation decreases, and of course, to keep up a company culture you have to do
something together” and adds that “to be in direct contact with people gives much more
“we” feeling compared to what you can create in video calls in our experiences”.

INT8 concludes that they have witnessed much greater interest among employees for such
social events, compared to the time before RW and HW, confirming that people do look
for similar gatherings to interact and connect with their colleagues. For example, much
greater number of people showed up for the company Christmas party compared to
previous years.

3.3.3.4 Regular Interval Employee Survey

INT5, whose company implemented 3 days in office rule, to begin with, is planning
changes into their HW approach based on feedback from the employees through regular
surveys they conduct i.e. “we had a lot of people complaining about that they would
rather not be in office for three days, but lesser and that’s what is now forcing us to think
about this hybrid workplace policy that we are starting to work on now from HR
perspective”. The plan to deploy regular employee satisfaction surveys to a greater extent,
enabling similarly to INT5 hear direct feedback and measure EE, was stated by
approximately half of the informants. INT8 acknowledges:

“I would have liked to have quarterly “pulse” survey (author: during the pandemic),
because if you do it every year, half of the team might have changed to another
department. It doesn't replace your talk with your team but it gives you feedback and data
and it would have given me some signals e.g., looking at the parameters, where is it
sticking out now…, and you could take action accordingly. Survey could also allow to

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avoid “one size fits all” approach but rather indicating different needs per different
teams/groups”.

While the previous statement was mainly about extensive RW during the pandemic, INT8
finds similar surveys equally beneficial in the HW setting. INT10 draws a direct link
between employee surveys and EE since employees are being given the chance to express
their opinion and have their say before decisions are taken. INT12 team has a monthly
survey established and they see tangible benefit from it since it allows to understand
current satisfaction level as well as provides concrete feedback for further improvements.

3.4 Hybrid Work Conditions with Potential Negative Influence

Certain conditions, illustrated in Figure 3, might have the potential of enabling the
emergence of negative effects for employees in the hybrid setting. In this chapter and in
the respective sub-chapters, a description of those negative outcomes which are the lack
of interaction, loos of culture, employee turnover, isolation, and newcomers’ struggle will
be explained as well as their consequences on employees.

Figure 3. Hybrid Workplace Conditions with Potential Negative Influence

3.4.1 Lack of Interaction

Dependent on the nature of work and tasks, the importance of interaction was perceived
differently as in IT services, for example, the problem of lack of interaction was
considered less negative than from employees working in other sectors as mentioned by
INT3 “if you are a computer programmer or something like that – maybe it’s easier to sit
at home, you are not disturbed and so on”. The need for social interaction may increase
dependent on the position of the employee, as an example if you have a managerial
position “it can sometimes be a challenge if not being able to meet your employees”
(INT3). Nevertheless, a lack of interaction was noticed by most of the informants, having
an impact on other aspects of their professional life such as their engagement. Lack of

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interaction having an impact on engagement is confirmed by Mutha et al (2021), as the
lack of proximity and face-to-face conversations may alter the engagement equation.
Equally, Weideman and Hofmeyr (2020) find in their study a negative correlation
between working in silos and employee engagement. Therefore, coordinated HW with
regular face-to-face interactions can eliminate the negative effects silos working would
have on EE. What is not evident in the existing literature, and therefore poses a future
area to research, is the extent how a well set up HW and face-to-face communication
could increase EE.

3.4.1.1 Loose of Culture

When meeting certain conditions, in the HW setting, various negative effects were
noticed among employees. One of the most critical issues that was highlighted, is the lack
of interaction in working from a home-centric setup. As a result, a loss of company culture
was often mentioned by the interviewees due to lack of interaction. To build on that
argument, when working remotely for an extensive amount of time there is a risk that it
may hinder the company culture and teamwork (INT10). Similarly, Alonso, A. (2022),
describes company culture as one of the top challenges for managers that emerged from
working remotely. Furthermore, English, (2022), mentions company culture to be crucial
for remote and hybrid work success. For companies, it becomes key to understand the
importance of increasing the chances for their employees to meet and create company
culture. English, L. (2022), aligns with the importance of meeting in person, by mixing
business and social activities to increase the company culture, in parallel tackling several
issues mentioned by our INTs such as isolation, and networking.

3.4.1.2 Employee Turnover

After reaching a certain point of not being able to interact there is a possibility of
increasing employee turnover as stated in INT1 “it’s hard to create the same sense of
belonging without loyalty if you don’t interact with the people”. Working mostly remotely
creates a different connection than working on-site, lowering the barriers to leaving your
workplace (INT1). From the INTs, because of working mostly from home, many
informants noticed a high turnover. Following that idea, Nursanti et al. (2015) and Lee &
Jang, (2020), state that organizational culture has a significant impact on employee
turnover intentions. To overcome this issue INT7 stated that meeting more physically
would have created stronger bonds and connections thus limiting this issue and further

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spreading the company’s culture which aligns with the theory of Nursanti et al., (2015)
and Lee & Jang, (2020).

3.4.1.3 Isolation
Having a screen separating employees during interactions might cause a feeling of not
being recognized (INT2) and a sense of abstraction if you work with a particular
department for several months only via a screen (INT8). From the findings, it was clear
that interviewees were in favour of a combination of working from home and the office
due to the importance of social interaction. Overall, the efficiency increased when
working from home, but the social interaction decreased, as the lack of interaction
becomes more prominent the “productivity to my understanding went lower again”
(INT5). Hence, companies must allow employees to change their work setups as it would
have a direct impact on their productivity.

INT9 brought up an interesting point of “the group of work has become tinier” and “the
only people that you meet are your family and your nearest team”, the lack of interaction
created the situation where employees have a smaller social circle, which impacted self-
worth and decreased the energy. Furthermore, the office is a place for networking, indeed
a lot of unexpected encounters might happen in that setup. Nevertheless, this networking
is limited in an RW centric setup as it is hard to do it via video (INT3). Isolation is often
linked to RW environments and is an important challenge in an RW setting (Van Zoonen,
& Sivunen, 2021). Similarly, it was noticed by our informants that working remotely for
a long period creates a sense of disconnect which decreases the engagement of employees
(INT6). As the social interaction becomes scarcer, a feeling of isolation can be noticed
amongst our informants, which is also stated by Bentham, (2021). Van Zoonen, &
Sivunen, (2021) mentions that this feeling of isolation could be lowered to some extent
with mediated communication, nevertheless having the opportunity to meet face-to-face
with co-workers would further solve this issue.

3.4.1.4 Newcomers Struggle

The feeling of isolation is further amplified if you are a newcomer, this employee category
was mentioned to have the most difficulties when primarily working remotely (INT1).
Other groups of employees that have already worked in the company before the pandemic
and were integrated in the company culture have an easier time compared to their

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counterparts (INT1). Newcomers have a higher risk of isolation and loss of culture, since
“you didn’t meet all your managers” (INT6), to avoid this issue INT11 states “I would
really urge them to get to the office as much as possible, and myself, in order to the
relationship going and really get the culture in their face”. English, L. (2022), via the
case study of Centric Consulting, states the necessity of teams to meet up face-to-face in
the instance of a new member joining, recurring issues, or key decision making. Hence,
there is a need for newcomers to have the opportunity to go into the office, implementing
a system where the company culture is shared online has a risk of failing as INT11
described his experience “To get the company’s culture to person via Teams – I have not
succeeded with that”.

3.5 Hybrid Work Conditions with Negative Influence

In the following sub-chapters, Hybrid Workplace (HW) conditions with a negative impact
on Employee Engagement (EE) are described, namely, and as illustrated in Figure 4,
overwork which drives work-life balance out of balance, and extensive remote working
which was seen as a factor directly decreasing the EE.

Figure 4. Hybrid Workplace with Negative Influence

3.5.1 Work-life Balance and Overwork

Overwork was another important downside of working mainly from home, as the lack of
interaction has a risk of losing track “of the blurring between private and business life”
(INT9) and “you are always on” (INT8). Most interviewees mentioned a constant theme
of workload, an INT6 relates overwork to the idea of isolation, since the communication
with the team is limited, you automatically put yourself “pressure that you have to
deliver” and prove “that you are doing something” (INT6). This pressure creates a
situation where often the interviewees were stepping on lunchtimes, working late, and
doing extra hours that ultimately has a risk of employee burnout. Lastly, working
remotely also influenced managers as they contact you more often in less conventional

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hours “they call you 22h, 21h30 in the evening you know” (INT6) which may be related
to the fact that employees are always online when working from home.

3.5.2 Drop in Engagement and Extensive Remote Work

The overall perceived engagement in an RW setup centric varied in function of the
informants and the companies that they were working for. INT6 mentions “for me the
driver for engagement is motivation right. I saw motivation drops”, for INT5 his
engagement drastically increased at the start of the implementation of RW but then
lowered due to the lack of interaction. This engagement level fluctuates in function of the
points aborded before as for INT2 “we saw a drop in engagement where we could point
at especially employee connection, both connection to their manager but also a
connection to their peers within the teams”. As said before employee engagement may
vary in function of the employee, following this idea INT8 implied a distinct perspective
on the take, in function of the generation, as younger employees have fewer resources
than other more settled employees this might influence their level of engagement.
Additionally, INT8 mentioned that having a family helped him in a way, this idea
strengthens the argument that younger employees would have a harder time coping with
working mainly remotely as the chance of them having a family is lower and their lack
of interaction greater. Lastly, INT11 stated his perceived engagement “I saw that problem
solving, culture, and engagement were low, and when I measured the ENPS (Employee
Net Promoter Score) that was low as well” to solve this issue further days working on-
site were advised.

It is not only about the company, but it is also about the individual as well, as stated by
INT4, certain profiles and personalities may fit better working remotely, as not being apt
to work from home may result in spiral thinking mainly about a loose of purpose creating
a snowball effect. Throughout the interview process, the findings show the importance of
a routine to have a well-established remote experience, if that does not help INT4 suggests
increasing the number of days in the office. Employees and even more so managers have
gradually more responsibilities and skills required, as it is key to understand each
individual and yourself, to best find the setup needed to increase everyone’s engagement.

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3.6 Positive Aspects of Hybrid Work
Several positive aspects can be noticed when implementing HW correctly, as explored in
this part and visualized in Figure 5. From the interviewees, HW was often described to
increase work-life balance, increasing the company culture via interaction and increase
engagement and motivation mainly due to the empowerment of allowing employees to
make their own choices.

Figure 5. Positive Aspects of HW

3.6.1 Work-life Balance and Working from Home Characteristics

There is a difference between working from home versus on-site noted through our
findings. Working from home has some specific characteristics and upsides when
implemented right. Indeed, a lot of INTs mentioned a work-life balance increase when
working remotely as mentioned in INT1 “We have seen more positive effects both when
it comes to work-life balance issues which brings health, also, less stress levels” and INT2
“it has make me slow down a little bit, I would probably put more hours but the fact that
I don’t need to travel anywhere or not going to the office that has definitely changed in a
positive direction”. Other interviewees praised the travel time that was lowered due to the
implementation of RW, as seen by INT3 “you save travel time”. Having spare time due
to saved commute has a direct impact on efficiency as it allows employees to spend more
time on their tasks (INT3). A feeling of being more efficient when working remotely can
be noticed by employees, as it allows you to focus more on the task at hand and waste
less time on “logistic planning” (INT4). The term “flexibility” was a lot of times used to
describe the utilization of RW centric setup, INT3 “it creates some flexibility in family
life”, thus, in turn, increasing work-life balance. Furthermore, working from home often
comes with ample choices for employees as stated by INT5 “I could wake up whenever I
want, and work up until I want. So, on one hand people really had the, uh I would say
energy and engagement and the flexibility that they enjoyed”. Following that idea of
flexibility, Bošković, (2021), confirms our findings since he characterizes working

55
remotely as greater freedom of choice concerning the choice of place, time, and how the
tasks are performed. Enabling employees to actively choose and decide by themselves is
a key factor of RW, as “this is giving people the self-confidence that they decide how to
do things, when to do things, and this makes them a bit proud as well, you can feel it”
(INT7). Flexibility was often correlated to having employees “go the extra mile” (INT7)
which is closely related to employee engagement. Having this in mind, employee
autonomy is connotated with increased employee engagement as stated by Bošković,
(2021) and Zhang et al., (2017), thus, giving the opportunity for workers to make their
own choices would increase their engagement. Lastly, this flexibility has also an impact
on employee efficiency, as employees have the option to choose the setup that suits best
in function of the task, increasing the overall productivity.

This flexibility became the new normal for certain employees and is increasingly
demanded amongst employees from their companies and managers. The usage of RW has
become even more crucial for companies and employees as it allows companies to be
more attractive employers as well as having a better balance in work-life and private life
for employees (INT1). INT8 even mentions that newcomers have a risk of demanding
this flexibility in the recruitment process. Informants in our study saw the flexibility, HW
provides, as a tool to improve work-life balance. Subsequently, the latter was seen as a
mean to enhance EE. The same notion is conveyed also by Inggamara et al. (2020) who,
based on extensive survey results, concludes that work-life balance is positively related
to work engagement. Similarly, Žnidaršič et al. (2021) study found that higher levels of
work-life balance have positive effect on work engagement. Seeing the theme of greater
work-life balance increasing EE, makes our theory align with findings from other studies.
In terms of our findings, based on the input from informants, the flexibility leading to
work-life balance which results in enhanced EE should be seen in a certain context and is
dependent on characteristics of how the HW setup is structured.

3.6.2 Build Company Culture and Interaction

Interaction was highlighted by several participants, expressing their different point of
views. Social interaction is important for employee well-being and is stated as a human
need by INT6, a lack of this need could even go to the extent to cause burnout. Having
the option to go to the office and meet other people was often described as a way to get
energy (INT3, INT9) and could be linked to employee engagement. Furthermore, INT11

56
explained the importance of meeting face to face as it could have a direct impact on team
members and customers, thus increasing productivity. INT1 views that interaction brings
value creativity to the organization and that the purpose of the office has changed quite a
bit as it is currently a mean “to meet and interact”. Additionally, the office tasks will
mainly be about creation, collaboration, and innovation (INT1). For INT2, interactions
are mainly about social and team activities to build up teamwork and the company culture.
It was pointed out that meeting some face-to-face has a different vibe to it and was
referred to by INT9 as “unquantifiable” since a lot of factors that play in communication
are non-verbal communication and allow managers to “pick up signals” (INT8).
Following that unquantifiable aspect, INT11 explained that having the ability to meet his
team before the usage of Microsoft conference for example eases up the process of
problem-solving. Interaction is described by the INTs as value creation due to the ability
for employees to interact with other departments or “you have also people here in place,
walking around in the corridor, over the open space, and we can easily talk with them”
(INT4) which can be neglected when working remotely and “could have an impact down
the line” (INT8). Just meeting other employees can create unexpected situations where
you learn more about your teammates or co-workers (INT9) which was described as key
by INT10 with the statement “but when you often go outside talk about other things,
you’re starting to know your colleagues more deeply and I think that is also an important
thing going forward to have the kind of an understanding of your friends and your
colleagues”.

3.6.3 Enhanced Employee Engagement, Increase in Motivation, and Energy

Engagement was mentioned several times by INTs, as a result of having the opportunity
to combine working remotely and on-site. Enabling employees to have the “freedom
choices” (INT2) was a recurrent theme throughout the interview process, since it
empowers employees, as choices can be made accordingly, in function of the employee
life and was described to increase engagement. Ijaz & Tarar, (2020) went to the extent to
describe this factor as one of the strongest predictors to increasing engagement and
according to Ryan & Deci (2000) employee autonomy is a prerequisite to increase
engagement. Our findings further highlight the importance of implementing employee
autonomy to increase employee engagement, further validating the existing theory
concerning this topic as mentioned by Ryan & Deci (2000), Ijaz & Tarar, (2020), and

57
Bošković, (2021). Empowering employees helped them in terms of self-confidence and
unleashed their potential, which is valuable for companies (INT7). Lastly, Ijaz & Tarar,
(2020), state that participation in key decision-making was noticed to have a positive
impact on employee engagement which relates to empowering employees.

Implementing a hybrid model has seen some positive feedback and was mentioned to
increase employee engagement, this could be explained by the fact that having the
opportunity to meet in a physical environment would lower certain key issues that
companies face. This can be seen in the instance of INT11.

“I saw the problem solving took a lot of time, and I heard frustration. Those frustrations
are fewer now when we're doing the hybrid model” which lead to “the numbers that I saw
in August (2021), we've seen the 200% raise (in January 2022), both when it comes to
engagement and when it comes to ENPS question. I don't think it's all to do with the
hybrid model, definitely not, but it helps” (INT11).

Meeting employees in the office ease up the issue of problem-solving as it becomes more
natural for employees, that have an issue, to talk about them to their management which
otherwise could have been ignored in remote centric work. Additionally, a hybrid
workplace would enable a certain degree of autonomy and as mentioned by Bošković,
(2021), allowing employee freedom would further limit certain key issues of RW such as
problem solving. This would lower the risk of having a snowball effect, where a small
issue turns into a bigger one over time, ultimately hindering the employee’s well-being
and engagement (INT11). INT11 also received direct feedback from employees that work
in that type of environment mainly as he described “extroverts” and employees “who are
single, living in apartments”. Again, as stated before in the findings section, working
remotely comes up in most cases with efficiency increase, work-life-balance, flexibility
as it is easier to focus on the task at hand and save travel time.

Battery recharger and energy kick were referred to by INT2 when going to the office and
meeting with colleagues and described the dynamic as “very different” from online
meetings. INT9 described his battery recharger when meeting co-workers from other
departments during social activities. Lastly, INT10, stated that going to the office and
interacting with either co-workers or customers gives him energy and underlies the risk
of working mostly from home as you need to find energy from somewhere. Overall, this

58
energy boost has been related to interaction with other people, but it could still be
subjective. This idea strengthens that having a mix of on-site work and RW would
increase engagement if the conditions are right.

3.7 Conclusion of Findings

This chapter summarizes the key themes emerging from the coding and the parallel
analysis process. The visualization of how the various elements of the theory is related to
each other, and how HW influences EE, is shown in Figure 6. Using the analogue of EE
being a battery, with HW nature and its’ various execution factors impacting whether HW
will have positive or negative impact on EE, exemplifies the potential implications HW
can have on EE. According to the core theme, what echoed from most of the informants’
input and emerged from codes and categories, is that HW has potential positive and
negative implications on EE but it is the HW setup defining what the eventual impact on
EE will be. In the following sections, details of the theory are further explained, followed
by Figure 6 illustrating the relation between different variables of the theory.

Distinguish HW from RW, and acknowledge the reasons driving the trend towards
HW becoming a widely accepted approach. The informants were familiar with the
basic concept of RW before the Covid-19 but acknowledged that the response to the
pandemic contributed towards mindset change among managers, making them see RW
and especially HW more favourably than before. The latter coupled with developments
in the ICT tools and companies seeing practical upsides from having employees partly
working from home, e.g., increased productivity, turned HW into a preferred workplace
solution after the pandemic.

Factors affecting the HW experience define whether the subsequent impact, from HW
on EE, is positive or negative. In other words, HW versus fully RW or fully on-site does
not have positive or negative implications on EE by default but the impact is defined by
the design and structure of how the HW is implemented. Purpose-based tasks for the
location, trust vs control-based leadership, balance between working virtually from home
vs meeting the team f-to-f, company office meeting the needs of the new reality, are all
examples of factors playing a role in what the implications from HW on EE will be.

59
Overwork due to the blurred borderline between home and work and extensive remote
working, were lacking the regular f-to-f interaction with colleagues, were seen as HW
conditions with negative influence on EE.

HW conditions with potential negative influence on EE are related to interaction and

depend largely on how the HW is set up and implemented. Namely, uncoordinated on-
boarding of a new employee, isolation, weakened company culture and increased
employee turnover can all have either direct or indirect negative influence on EE.

Positive influence of HW on EE are the results of the increased flexibility which

improves employees’ work-life balance, the possibility to meet f-to-f and build company
culture – especially if the gatherings and f-to-f, meetings are properly coordinated.
Consequently, employees’ motivation and energy are positively affected. Ultimately,
employee engagement increases.

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Figure 6.1Hybrid Workplace Implications on Employee Engagement

61
4. CONSLUSION
______________________________________________________________________
Having analysed the empirical findings which laid the foundation for the theory of this
research, in parallel with discussing the themes that emerged and positioning those in
relation to established academic literature, this chapter articulates the summary in
relation to the research question and overall purpose of this paper. In addition,
theoretical and practical implications as well as limitations of this study are included as
sub-chapters of the conclusion.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________

4.1 Answer to Purpose

With the purpose to understand the relationship between a hybrid workplace and
employee engagement, by answering the research question regarding the implications
hybrid workplace setup has on employee engagement, it can be concluded that employee
engagement is affected by the hybrid approach as a workplace arrangement. To reach this
conclusion, we dedicated key importance to the data we collected from the selected
informants. The themes emerging from the primary data enabled us to understand the
relationship between the variables of this study, and ultimately establish the theory which
explains hybrid workplace implications on employee engagement. Thus, while
familiarizing us with the established literature which mostly lacked the direct link
between the variables of our study and merely supported the process of establishing the
research question, the meanings surfaced from the input collected from the interviews
with the informants. The latter follows the Saunders et al. (2019) inductive research
approach. Hence, we started with so-called black box and derived the constructs of our
theory from the data we gathered from the interviewees. Consequently, patterns based on
the insights from the informants enabled to develop the model explaining how certain
factors of the hybrid work setup shape the impact on employee engagement.

With some elements of hybrid work being perceived as by-default positive factors on
employee engagement, certain hybrid work conditions on other hand are interpreted as
having a negative influence on employee engagement. Therefore, our research concludes
that hybrid work implications on employee engagements are dependent on hybrid work
design and implementation. Similarly, as flexibility, autonomy, and improved work-life
balance can result in a hybrid setup positively affecting employee engagement, can

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isolation, overwork and weakened company culture have an equally negative impact on
employee engagement. Consequently, the nature of the hybrid workplace defines the
implications it has on employee engagement. Organizations, targeting to achieve work
engagement among their employees, should derive their hybrid workplace design
decisions from purpose of the work tasks, exercise trust versus control-based leadership,
facilitate regular communication, and make face-to-face meetings attractive to attend.
Additionally, the new reality calls for a rethinking of how the company offices are
designed, especially if employees are expected to work partly on-site, to match the
requirements hybrid workplace poses, and as a result maximize the positive effect on
employee engagement.

Our research shows that a hybrid workplace can serve as the best of two worlds by
providing greater flexibility and improved work-life balance to employees, consequently
enhancing their engagement, at the same time increasing the productivity and efficiency
of the output for the employer. The equation, to achieve this positive result, is conditional
upon purpose driven nature of how the hybrid workplace is set up and implemented.

4.2 Theoretical Implications

As illustrated in Appendix 1, a growing number of academic articles are tackling the
questions related to remote and hybrid work. Still, very few of them have put emphasis
on understanding the impact a hybrid workplace setup can have on employee
engagement. Therefore, our research adds further rigour into this field of knowledge in
parallel with highlighting other topics and perspectives, related to hybrid work and
engagement, laying foundation for future research.

The findings and conclusion of this paper contribute to the knowledge of acknowledging
a variety of factors connected to the hybrid workplace approach, and their relation to
employee engagement. This type of overall conclusions regarding hybrid solution,
without narrowing the results to a specific industry, culture, or geographic region, pose
certain limitations but equally open up wider comprehension around hybrid workplace as
a workplace discipline. Following the social constructionist epistemology, it is the
interpretation and new understanding (Saunders et al., 2019) on hybrid workplace and
employee engagement relationship our study contributes to. Through interpretation of the
collected data, and later in some extent positioning it among established theories, our

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research makes one of the first attempts to connect the various elements of the hybrid
workplace to employee engagement, demonstrating whether the latter is positively or
negatively affected depending on how hybrid work is configured.

While some existing studies are mainly focusing on the negative effects remote and
hybrid work can cause (Grotto et al., 2022; Palumbo, 2020) and other researches highlight
positive aspects similar flexible work arrangements can bring (Radonic et al., 2021;
Weideman and Hofmeyr, 2020), our paper sheds a light on both positive and negatives
conditions of a hybrid workplace, demonstrating how the configuration of the hybrid
approach plays a role in terms of affecting employee engagement. Thus, and according
to earlier explained literature searches as well as visualized in Appendix 1, we see our
study adding incremental yet valuable new comprehension in the field of workplace
setup, explicitly around hybrid approach and its impact on employee engagement.

4.3 Practical Implications

Our paper gives further information concerning the relationship between hybrid
workplace and employee engagement. Allowing managers and companies to have a better
grasp of the concept of a hybrid workplace, more specifically what factors influence
employee engagement in a hybrid setup. These practical implications are targeted at
companies and managers that work with white-collar employees since implementing a
hybrid setup for this group would be feasible.

A common theme throughout the interview process was employee flexibility vs structure.
Employee autonomy and flexibility were praised by many informants as it is a key upside
in an HW setup, even going to the extent of increasing employee engagement.
Nevertheless, some structural elements were mentioned to have a certain degree of
coordination and should be designed to enhance and enable employee engagement. Based
on our findings, we recommend managers to steer for as few rules as possible in terms of
hybrid workplace setup since alternatively it can pose a risk of hindering employee
flexibility. Managers should still maintain a certain structure and routines, as it was seen
that combining routines and face-to-face interactions increases employee engagement. It
is important for the guidelines from the company to serve a purpose and be as clear as
possible concerning what is expected. Following that idea, it is advisable for team
managers to have constant communication with their team or employees as well as doing

64
constant check-ups either via one-on-ones or surveys. Not only would this enable to lower
the risk of impeding the flexibility of employees, but it would also validate the opinions
of individuals and teams, thus empowering them and ultimately impacting their
engagement. This would further create meaningful guidelines as employees are the core
of the company and have an important word to say about the topic, hence we would also
encourage employees to be as clear as possible when communicating with their managers.

As mentioned in the findings section, it is crucial for managers to know the individuals
in their team as each one of them has a different personality. Encouraging the team
members to participate in social activities, and team meetings is a must to bring the team
together and have a positive effect on employee engagement. Additionally, we would
encourage managers to match individuals with certain tasks depending on their
personality when going to the office. We would like to emphasize the importance for
managers to be able to analyse a situation and the mood of their team members, taking
the first step towards them in the instance of a negative feeling. Thus, the manager should
encourage individuals to meet face-to-face, enable culture building or empower them.
Additionally, managers shouldn’t fall into the trap of only listening to the “loudest”
(INT7) employees, as checking on introverts is just as important.

These recommendations are mainly for companies, as in some instances, informants went
to the extent, of mentioning a manager specialised in the creation of events and well-
being which could be useful for companies that are seeking help in team-building
activities, social activities, or the well-being of their employees. Additionally, the nature
of the office has changed and is considered now as a place to meet and communicate.
Hence, companies should encourage employees to communicate in the office and do tasks
that demand concentration remotely. Furthermore, certain coordination is needed when
going to the office that should be decided between managers and employees, as it would
not add value to demand employees showing up to the office for the sake of just being in
the office. Hence, it is purpose what should drive going to the office. Another relevant
point is that since the nature of the office has changed, it is important to have a structure
that matches the new purpose of that said new office. Thus, we recommend companies to
create an office that enables the new communication and interaction purpose, coupled
with quiet spaces to allow meetings, both virtually and face-to-face.

65
4.4 Limitations
The first limitation of this study is time constraints. Indeed, having a wider pool of
participants would have further ensured greater detail of our study and increased the
relevancy of our findings. A common consensus mentioned by our informants was being
positive about a hybrid workplace and the need for social interaction. Nevertheless, this
need for social interaction might differ depending on the industry, as was mentioned by
INT 3, employees from the IT sector might need less social interaction. Further focusing
on the industry of the participants could have added value to our study, having more time
would have enabled us to interview more informants from the IT sector to further validate
this finding and draw conclusions from it. Furthermore, our findings show several factors
affecting the HW experience and consequently employee engagement, and although
useful insights were brought up in this paper concerning those factors, we still think that
they need to be further investigated, relating again to time constraints.

The second limitation is partly conducting the research during the COVID-19 pandemic.
We conducted all our interviews virtually, except for one being in a hybrid setup. Even
though the video was always used to conduct our interviews, to enable observation of
non-verbal cues, we still think it was rather limited, as face-to-face interaction would have
allowed us to have the more in-depth input coupled with non-verbal observations.

The third limitation is related to the methods of the interviews, since we decided to
conduct qualitative research and semi-structured interviews, the insights gathered are
subjective depending on the informant. This is further accentuated in a combination of
our own perception as researchers of their experiences. Hence, we cannot prove the
findings and insights of this study objectively.

4.5 Future Research

During our study, we were able to create our own model (Figure 6) on the hybrid
workplace implications on employee engagement. This model gives an overview of our
findings, nevertheless, as was mentioned in 4.4 limitations it could be further improved
by having more detailed information concerning the factors affecting the HW experience
which play a major role in employee engagement. Thus, we think that further research
about the role of leadership, future office, and successful HW pre-requisites would add
further value to our study and increase the relevancy of Figure 6. This could be done via

66
more extensive interviews with informants, not only interviewing companies and
employees that are using a hybrid setup but also experts on the matter (Communication
experts, management/leadership experts...), focusing more on those three sections.
Additionally, those factors could be a study on their own. It would be important to have
a more precise idea of the role of leadership in HW setup to increase employee
engagement, the successful HW pre-requisites, and the new purpose of the office, since
it would enable us to have a more complete idea of the factors affecting employee
engagement (EE) through HW. Hence, having the highest chances to increase employee
engagement when having an HW setup.

Additionally, as it was stated in the interview process, a common consensus was that a
certain structure was needed to perform HW but rather limited to still enable flexibility
for employees and therefore, should be designed in a manner that increases employee
engagement. As there is this dilemma of structure against flexibility, other researchers
could look more in-depth into this topic, since we think it would be crucial to have a better
idea of how much structure is needed to increase employee engagement. This study
focuses on the hybrid workplace setup's impact on employee engagement, and we give
some practical recommendations on how to implement a hybrid setup that could lead to
employee engagement. It would be interesting to have the other side of the scope,
researching how companies unsuccessfully implement an HW setup, which would widen
the knowledge about the concept of a hybrid workplace. Additionally, our results
correlate with the findings of Halford, (2005), and validate the idea of having specific
tasks performed in certain setups dependent of the employee, accordingly, a relevant
research question could be “What type of work tasks fit in a certain workplace
environment in the hybrid setting?”.

Lastly, even though our study excluded technology factors, several informants mentioned
it during the interview process having an impact on their engagement and motivation.
Technology offers an interesting topic to research since it could potentially overcome
certain key issues when working in a hybrid setup, as one of our informants mentioned
that when having a hybrid meeting, technology could create a feeling that everyone is in
the same room, thus limiting the issue of having two meetings at the same time. Hence, a
future research question could be “To what extent investing in technology could

67
overcome key issues of hybrid meetings?” or extend the question to a more general topic
“To what extent does invest in technology could overcome key issues of a hybrid setup?”.

68
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Appendixes

Appendix 1 Key Words Search Results

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Appendix 2 Interview Questions and Themes Development

• Version 1
1. General introduction and definitions.
2. Your takeaways/reflection about enforced remote working?
3. What kind of approach would increase the engagement of employees while having the
option to work remotely?
4. How familiar are you with the concept of hybrid workplace arrangement?
5. What are the differences between a forced remote working environment and having a
hybrid setup?
6. Main challenges related are to hybrid and your approach how to deal with those challenges
as employee/manager?
7. In case of hybrid model, where employee works mainly remotely, what should be the
purpose of the corporate office?

• Version 2
1. General introduction and definitions.
2. Looking back, after two years of pandemic, what are your takeaways and reflections on the
impact of remote work?
3. Did you notice any negative side effects, e.g., disengagement?
4. Is it correct interpretation that the benefits employees felt, when starting to work remotely,
decreased over time?
5. What do you see are the main benefits when having the chance of working from home,
while at the same time having the chance of going back to the office when they want to,
would there be positive impact on their engagement?
6. Do you think that you or your team would opt for hybrid setup as the preferred option?
7. Do you see any risks related to hybrid workplace approach?
8. Should hybrid work include minimum number of days, e.g., two days, when all the people
are together in the office?
9. How to ensure that all members of your team are equally contributing, considering different
characteristics of people?
10. What the purpose of the office should be when people are now dividing their days between
home and office?
11. Would having a higher gap (longer interval) between meeting your team in the office have
a higher impact?
12. What are the social activities you were mentioning during the interview?

• Version 3
1. General introduction and definitions.
2. Have you got some feedback from you team members, or experienced yourself, when
working from home only?
3. Did you notice lack of engagement among your team members when people needed to
work from home?
4. Any other positive aspects you would pinpoint about the remote work?
5. What would have a positive impact on employees’ engagement and what would be the best
model moving forward?
6. Would you say that the purpose for office wouldn’t be same-same as home and in the
corporate office?
7. Are there guidelines how the hybrid setup is governed and are there certain activities when
you are in the office?
8. Will there be more strict steering in terms of hybrid model?
9. Are you taking different approach towards certain team-members, getting them to office?

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 10. Is it better - to be in office little bit more frequently, with less interval or is it ok for long
periods away from office?
11. Why did you opted to go with the hybrid model?
12. Did you receive any direct feedback on remote working from any of your team members?
13. Did your company do any contributions when people started to work remotely in the
beginning of the pandemic?
14. Do you see any difference between enforced remote working vs free of choice - the hybrid
model now?
15. Can you highlight main negatives and positives hybrid model brings compared to the
enforce remote working?
16. Is corporate office preferred for some type of meetings and presentations since you can see
attendees body language?
17. How does the communication take place in your team, is it bottom-up or top-down?

• Version 4
1. General introduction and definitions.
2. What was the longest period you worked fully from home during the pandemic?
3. How did you meet during the pandemic, was it also by video and then physical or was it
directly physical?
4. What are your main takeaways, reflections from this enforced/mandatory remote working
setup?
5. Have you decided what the new setup will look like?
6. In a hybrid setting, what do you do as a manager if you see change in team member’s
attitude and engagement? Did you have any such situations in your team?
7. Seeing the value in the hybrid model, in parallel with people at least from time to time
showing up in office, can you breakdown that value from people coming to office and
meeting physically?
8. Are there solutions, you believe would increase employee engagement, yours personally
and your colleagues?
9. Regarding the one-to-ones - are you conducting those face-to-face nowadays?
10. How do you see the hybrid model standard/guidelines/policy should be governed in terms
of flexibility vs rules?
11. As a manager, would you benefit from meeting your team members face-to-face, enabling
to understand and decide on the approach what suits best for each employee?
12. Having a team situated in same country, would more frequent f-to-f team meetings add
value?
13. Do you see value in/future for office-hotels?
14. Did you come across situations where borderline between work and private life became
blurred?
15. Do those who had the problem of mixing the two (private life and work) will have it better
in the hybrid model since then they would close the laptop (during the days in the office)?

• Version 5
1. General introduction and definitions.
2. What are your takeaways from working remotely in a mandatory setting?
3. What were those methods you tried to engage employees? And did they work?
4. Did your company conduct satisfaction or well-being surveys during the pandemic?
5. Have you seen any difference between full remote and this kind of new normal existing
now?
6. Did you see, when people were returning to office, some positive developments?
7. The 50/50 rule you mentioned, was that a policy? Guideline?
8. Is there a risk to have two meetings going on at the same time?
9. Do you see change in the purpose of the office?
10. Did you feel that you got the best of two worlds with hybrid?

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11. As an onboarding process (on new employee) does it makes sense to have it face-to-face?
12. What do you need to find the characteristics of your team and how to select the right
approach?
13. How flexible should be guidelines? Is there a risk of hindering flexibility?
14. Do you see difference when working in the office with different frequencies (i.e., interval)?
15. Would burnout lead to disengagement? Is there solution?
16. Do you see change happening in a bigger scale in the future on how we work and
communicate?

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Appendix 3 Research Participants (Informants) Consent Form

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