Five years ago, offices went dark practically overnight. Today, they’re caught in an awkward half-light as companies and workers wage an increasingly bitter battle over where work should happen. Amazon just mandated five days back in the office for all employees. Dell, Walmart, and federal agencies are following suit. Meanwhile, workers are voting with their feet, with just 20% of job postings offering remote work now receiving a staggering 60% of all applications.
This isn’t just about preference anymore. It’s about fundamentally different visions of what work should be, and the data tells a story that’s far more complicated than either side wants to admit.
The Productivity Question Nobody Can Answer
Here’s where things get interesting. Remote workers report being 35-40% more productive at home, with 62% saying they accomplish more without office distractions. Companies have slashed real estate costs and seen lower turnover among employees with flexible arrangements. A study of a Turkish call center found agents working from home handled 10% more calls than their pre-pandemic counterparts.
But two leading management professors, Peter Cappelli of Wharton and Ranya Nehmeh from Vienna’s University of Applied Sciences, have documented something darker happening beneath those rosy numbers. In their new book “In Praise of the Office,” they argue that remote work has become “increasingly problematic over time” in ways that productivity metrics completely miss.
The problem isn’t that people are working less – it’s that they’re learning less, connecting less, and caring less about anything beyond their immediate tasks. Entry-level workers can’t learn by observation anymore. Mid-level employees are becoming detached as work shrinks to what fits on a screen. Senior people admit the workplace has gotten “much worse” even as their own flexibility has improved.
Death by a Thousand Pings
The erosion shows up in unexpected ways. Nehmeh describes Gen Z workers as “very transactional” – they show up, do their job, and leave, with no interest in organizational culture or the social aspects of work. Some companies are now offering etiquette classes teaching young professionals how to act in meetings and talk to clients, skills people used to absorb naturally by being around colleagues.
But Cappelli and Nehmeh don’t blame young workers. They blame terrible management. “Management’s just gotten worse,” Cappelli says bluntly, pointing to how supervisors defaulted to monitoring KPIs during the pandemic rather than developing better remote leadership skills.
Consider what happens when someone needs help now. You can’t pop your head into someone’s office – you have to schedule a call, send a ping, and hope they respond. “They may not respond back if they don’t know you,” Nehmeh explains. And even if they do see your message, it goes to “the bottom of their stack” because they’re drowning in their own KPIs.
The office used to run on social relationships and informal collaboration. Now it’s been reduced to pings, scheduled calls, and transactional exchanges. Cappelli conducted focus groups with 760 people, and the refrain was consistent: I’ll get to your request after I finish my own work.
The Zoom Fatigue Is Real
Then there are the meetings. Oh, the meetings. They seem more efficient than in-person gatherings, but research shows they’re actually making workers less productive while extending the average workday. People tune out, turn off their cameras, and do other work during calls that would have seemed bizarrely rude five years ago.
It’s gotten so bad that some people now send AI agents to take notes while they skip meetings entirely. When meetings get too big and nothing gets done, teams schedule post-meeting meetings to figure out what actually happened. “It’s a mess,” Cappelli says. “Those things could be fixed, but they’re not being fixed.”
What Happens Next
The office vacancy rate in the U.S. stands at nearly 20%, up significantly from pre-pandemic norms. But workers aren’t ready to fill them back up – nearly half say they’d look for new work if forced back full-time. When surveyed about their ideal arrangement, 70% of job seekers include hybrid in their top two preferences, while only 19% want to be in the office five days a week.
The irony is that both sides have legitimate points. Workers aren’t imagining the productivity gains and improved well-being that flexibility brings. But companies aren’t imagining the cultural erosion and learning gaps that fully remote work creates.
The answer probably isn’t found at either extreme. Successful organizations are building hybrid models with intention – making office days count through meaningful collaboration, measuring outcomes instead of hours, and giving teams autonomy to find their own optimal balance. They’re investing in technology that enables seamless work regardless of location while creating purposeful reasons to gather in person.
Because here’s the uncomfortable truth: we spent five years proving that remote work could function during an emergency. Now we’re learning that functioning and thriving are two different things entirely. The companies that figure out how to do both – offering flexibility while preserving the unquantifiable benefits of human connection – will win the talent wars ahead.