As a result of the sudden and unprecedented lockdown at the
beginning of 2020 in one country after the other, most employees
had to rush home and work from there. In the Netherlands a complete
lockdown started mid-March 2020, so we have now been working
remotely for over 1.5 years. The concern of most employers in the
beginning was: how does our personnel keep this up?
As it turned out, most employees did manage to keep it
up, and did so quite well. In fact, the lockdown has clearly showed
the possibilities and advantages of remote working (no more time
wasted commuting, more opportunity to organise one's own
working day, etc). But there were also concerns, for example, about
employee wellbeing after being isolated for a long time, not
everyone's home situation being well equipped for a home
office, and so on. Sometimes it is just the simple things that
employees miss, like the cups of coffee and the 'coincidental
encounters' with other colleagues.
