Office life or teleworking? For the past twenty years or so, Ameublement français has been monitoring quality of life at work through its biennial Actineo barometer. The tenth Actineo survey, based on a survey of 1,200 working people, is an unsurprising endorsement of the importance of teleworking. anchoring teleworking into habits. Whereas in 2019 only 53 % of professionals were teleworking, today 72 % work outside the office, even if only occasionally, with up to three different workplaces in a single week. It's a solution that's met with widespread approval, with almost half of French people even wanting to telework more in the future, up to 2.5 days a week.
The pandemic has come and gone, cementing a trend that had been in the making for the previous decade. Among the working people questioned for this ObSoCo survey, 44% had teleworked during the month, mainly at home (42%). And with pleasure, since 88% say they enjoy working at home.
But that doesn't mean working less, despite a generation of old-school managers. Teleworkers say they are more committed to their work when they are at home. In fact, 85 % of French people feel that they can to fully carry out their professional duties at homecompared with 79 % when they are in the office. 37 % of working people say they find it hard to concentrate when they are face-to-face.
No doubt they also appreciate this way of working for the freedom it affords, even if, at the same time, the boundary between professional and personal life is becoming blurred. A freedom that professionals would like to see even greater. 66 % of the 1,200 working people questioned find it desirable to be able to work from the location of their choice, while 55 % would like to be able to work from the location of their choice. organise their working week as they see fitWith no fixed working hours and no difference between weekdays and weekends. Looking further ahead and into the next decade, a four-day week with a reduction in working time to 32 hours is a development that 68% of the professionals surveyed would like to see.
As for business nomadism outside the home, the main third-party workplaces are customers' premises (14 %), public transport (13 %), terraces and public parks such as restaurants and cafés (12 %), but also these major hotspots for business travellers hotels and passenger areas in stations and airports, or coworking spaces (6 to 7 %). In hotels, travellers mainly work in their rooms (82%) rather than in common areas. The Actinéo barometer shows that there is still room for improvement in making hotels suitable workplaces, particularly in terms of comfort and ergonomics.
And yet, while the world of work is becoming increasingly decentralised in terms of both time and space, it is also becoming increasingly complex, the office is far from dead. "The possibility of the end of the office had been envisaged, but this is not the case." commented Antoine Vaguet, Director of Research and Consulting at ObSoCo. Especially as 56% of respondents still claim to work exclusively face-to-face, particularly, as the study shows, employees based in the regions where teleworking is less developed than in the Paris region. Among sedentary employees, the study also shows a higher proportion of people from CSP- and white-collar backgrounds, as well as over-55s, compared with CPS+ and managers in large companies.
If the office retains all its strength, it is above all for its art of organising exchanges and moments of conviviality. For 70 % of respondents, the value of coming to the office lies in this relationship with others. Sociability is essential to quality of life at work for the vast majority of employees. But at a time when quality of life is down 10 points on 2019, when more than 40% of employees no longer feel committed to their work, and when stress at work grips half of the professionals surveyed, the office property sector is being urged to do more to create spaces conducive to this social bond: a tea/coffee corner, a terrace, a relaxation area, an open-access kitchen, a cafeteria, a company restaurant... Enough to make people want to come back to the office. And to stay there.
