The war over return-to-office (RTO) policies rages on, as many employers continue the push to bring remote staff back into the office while employees largely resist those efforts. While the employer-employee dynamic is the main face of the RTO battle, there’s another key element that deserves attention: recruiter-job candidate.
While it’s not easy for employers to convince remote workers to return to the office, it can be even more challenging for an in-office company to recruit candidates who are currently fully remote or part of a hybrid scheme. Similarly, it can be challenging to convince a potential new hire to switch from fully remote to hybrid or from hybrid to fully in-office.
For this feature, we reached out to industry experts to get a sense of the challenges they face recruiting remote workers for in-office jobs and the strategies they use to manage those efforts.
The Key Importance of Leverage
Establishing the employer-employee relationship is fundamentally a process of negotiation, and every negotiation involves leverage. If a potential new hire currently has a remote job and is simply looking for new opportunities, an employer may not have significant leverage. If the employee doesn’t get the remote work arrangement they want, they can simply stay at their current job.
Similarly, if an employer sees a potential new hire as the best available option for a critical role, the worker may have considerable leverage to negotiate for the perks they’re after.
By contrast, if a candidate has been out of work for a number of months, they may be eager to take just about any role they can, thereby giving the employer some leverage.
Being Flexible When Possible
Just as with any other aspect of employment, like salary, job duties, etc., employers are encouraged to be flexible with a desired candidate when possible. In other words, if a candidate is a rockstar and is for sure the right person for the job, employers should look for ways to accommodate workplace preferences to the extent the role allows.
“As a HR and Recruiting Professional, I don’t subscribe to a one size fits all mentality and approach; others may disagree,” says Jennifer Preston, a Senior HR Consultant for Flex HR. “I believe what works for one role, one level, one person, and one functional area, may not entirely work for a different team with different expertise and skills within the same organization.”
Preston recommends that companies look at their workforce and determine what’s best for the organizations, its teams, and its employees. “Of course, ensuring there is no discrimination or perceived discrimination with such decisions is incumbent on Human Resources and the organization,” she adds.
Hey! What About Me?
While it can be tempting for a company to make exceptions to the in-office work policy for a rockstar candidate, it’s important to avoid situations that could make existing employees grumble about what they see as unfair treatment. “If the new gal on the finance team gets to work from home two days per week, why do the rest of us have to come in Monday through Friday?”
Creating exceptions, especially if they aren’t based on objective, organizationally important criteria, can give the impression of arbitrary rules and favoritism. This can lead to widespread disengagement and even turnover.
Theresa Balsiger, VP of Candidate Relations at Carex Consulting Group argues that exceptions should be avoided to avoid this kind of damage to company culture and the overall sense of fairness in the organization.
“Companies must decide what’s right for their strategy, values, and culture, and then create a policy around on-site/hybrid/remote,” Balsiger says. “Once decided upon, senior leaders should deeply understand why the decision was made and be able to clearly and objectively explain the decision to team members,” she says.
“Importantly, if you find you’d be unable to defend the decision, perhaps you revisit the policy, Balsiger advises. “If approached incorrectly, this can kill culture, retention, and engagement of your top talent.”
Once the policy is set and communicated, you can’t make exceptions, Balsiger stresses. “That doesn’t mean that, when creating the policy, you can’t carve out certain roles—but it needs to happen at the policy level when the change is made, not just due to circumstances,” she says. “Again, this should all be communicated and justifiable, or it will most certainly damage culture.”
How to Sweeten the Deal
At the end of the day, an employee giving up the flexibility that comes with remote work will likely expect to be compensated in some fashion for that sacrifice. For example, one would not expect a fully remote worker making $150,000 per year to accept a nearly identical role that also pays $150,000 per year but requires them to be fully in office. Something would need to exist to distinguish the new role from the old such that a shift to in-office work is palatable.
“Recruiting talent away from remote roles can be challenging, as many candidates have grown accustomed to the benefits of working from home,” notes Jon Moran, CEO and Editor-in-Chief of Venture Smarter. To make on-site positions more appealing, he says, it’s essential to enhance the overall compensation package. This could mean offering higher salaries, additional perks, or unique benefits that are tailored to the needs and interests of the potential hires.
“Emphasizing the advantages of on-site work, such as better collaboration opportunities and access to company resources, can also help in making the transition more attractive,” Moran says.
While such deal sweeteners often come in the form of higher pay, that’s not necessarily a silver bullet if the candidate is not truly sold on a return to office, says Meredith Bowen, founder of Walker Bowen Talent Partners, and a veteran recruitment professional.
“Sweetening the deal may be a short-term band-aide to fill the role, but it doesn’t guarantee a long-term match,” says Bowen. “Some might accept more pay to move to hybrid or on-site to help offset the costs of commute and other return to office related expenses, but this will only work long term if they’re already open to RTO. A flexible schedule is typically a great motivator for any employee, as is work life balance which comes with a flexible schedule.”
Some companies may feel they’ve painted themselves into a corner with their RTO policies when faced with a promising candidate who is used to remote work. But these organizations should remember that they (presumably) put their RTO policies in place for a reason. Making too many ad hoc exceptions can create impressions of arbitrariness and unfairness.
Instead, companies can consider finding other ways to sweeten the deal for specific candidates while also considering broader changes to the overall RTO policy if they find their approach ends up being unworkable in practice.
Lin Grensing-Pophal is a Contributing Editor at HR Daily Advisor.