When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, most companies shifted to a remote work setup. Now that the world is adapting to the new normal, employers are beginning to explore more setup options like hybrid working.
What Is Hybrid Working?
In its most basic sense, hybrid working combines the conventional face-to-face setup and remote work.
There isn’t a single hybrid work setup that all companies use. Most of the time, they offer many hybrid work models depending on the nature of your job.
What Are The Different Hybrid Work Models?
Below are some of the most common hybrid work models.
Note that these aren’t the only ones out there. These models typically depend heavily on your employer or company.
Remote-First Or Office-First Models
The remote-first, or office-first model, means that employees work primarily onsite or remotely, but they also have a few days to do the opposite.
For example, an employee under the office-first model must spend most of the week onsite. However, they can spend the remaining days of the week working remotely as well.
Typically the schedule is based on the employer. While it does allow employees to work with different setups, it doesn’t necessarily give them the choice of when they can do it.
This means there are set days when employees are onsite and set days when they aren’t.
Flexible Hybrid Model
As the name suggests, this model gives the employee the flexibility to choose when to come into the office and when to stay at home for remote work.
This decision heavily depends on the tasks or projects the employee is working on. They come in when they’re physically needed in the office. Otherwise, they work remotely.
One of the challenges of this model is the possible difficulty in scheduling. Since individual employees are given a choice to go into the office or not, it might become challenging to sync everyone’s schedule and call for a team meeting.
This is especially true if employers have to call urgent face-to-face meetings without prior planning.
Split-Team Model
A split-team model recognizes that some people work better in a remote setup, while some in a conventional face-to-face office. From here, employees are split into teams; one that works onsite and one that works remotely.
Typically, this is for companies who can’t employ a fully remote work option because their field requires people working onsite. A good example is a company running physical factories and selling products online.
Those manning the machines, of course, need to stay onsite. However, those who work on the marketing end—such as graphic artists who make collaterals—can do their job remotely.
Final Thoughts
What is hybrid working? This style of work is an attempt to unite remote work and conventional office setups.
There are a couple of different models under hybrid work setups. Usually, it depends on how your job works and your company’s decision. This type of setup generally benefits both the employer and the employee. The greatest benefit is the flexibility it offers.
