Online or in-person? Have we passed that question yet?

On my walk today, I noticed a woman wearing a gray fleece embroidered with “Harvard Business School Online.” She reminded me of how learning (and working) has changed over the past decade.  We are all now familiar with online learning and remote work. In our office, we were all 100% in the office until 2000, when we moved our office from Downtown Boston to Cambridge.

Locals know that Boston is a hub and spoke model for roadways and transportation, so Downtown is still a preferred location for most workers in the area.  One of our team members, Monique J. (who lives south of the city) was able to take the Commuter Rail to our office near South Station and walk to the office when we were in the Downtown area, but when we moved to Cambridge, her commute time increased by 50%. So, in the year 2000 (that is not a typo), we set up a computer in her home with log-me-in to connect to our systems in the office.  We had our first remote worker.

Monique continued to come to the Cambridge Office twice per week, but when in 2023 we moved to Winchester (a beautiful commuter town north of the city), her commute increased another 20 minutes or so, and her desire to come to the office reduced proportionally. We now see her in the office maybe 3 times per month, and on Teams every day.

The funniest part of her story is that we were recently hired by her neighbor to design a new house in the lakes district of New Hampshire, and even though they are neighbors, the meetings have been held on Teams, just because it’s easier to review plans online. Sometimes, even though our office is only a ten-minute commute by car away, I often work from home and do Teams and Zoom calls from my home office. These remote meeting tools were not available in 2000, but since 2020 they are part of, dare I say, everyone’s lives.

Now we have seen our office clients work completely remotely, hybrid, and fully in the office.  What do you prefer?  Do you work part-time from home and part-time in the office? What do you think is best for you? There was one article in 2020 or ’21 that claimed that less innovation happens when people are not in the office together every day, but I for one, think that story has changed since our overall comfort of using remote tools has increased.

For me, my second favorite thing about working remotely (first being retaining a super-star like Monique), is that I volunteer a lot of my time in both professional and non-profit organizations.  Remote meetings, avoiding adding another hour or two to volunteer efforts, have been life-changing! I miss fewer meetings, and everyone gets to the meetings on time!

Let me know if the topic of online vs. in person has been settled.  Share your story with me and I’ll report in a future post.