Call it the “office coordination tax.”
The everyday friction of hybrid work—from finding an open conference room to managing schedules across time zones—costs the average mid-sized company $9 million annually, according to a new study from workplace management platform Robin.
Robin estimates that those losses can reach $14,000 per employee annually, based on workers’ estimates of time spent on workplace coordination and U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics compensation benchmarks.
Put in terms of productivity: Employees are losing some 10% of their workweek to workplace logistics instead of the work itself.
But are these findings evidence that remote work purists have been right all along or ammunition for the return-to-office crowd? Ironically, it gives both sides something to celebrate. The report’s findings bring to mind recent conversations that capture both sides of this debate.
