Declining Employee Engagement: Is Remote Work to Blame or RTO Mandates?

There are a growing number of stories and reports pointing fingers at declining employee engagement scores among remote workers. From Gallup to Fortune , the data seems to be pouring in and some pundits have ceased upon the data as yet more proof that the remote work experience needs to be brought to an end. But, before proponents of mandated Return-to-Office (RTO) marches become even more bombastic, perhaps we should ask a basic question: Is remote work to actually to blame? Or, could it be that the clamor for, and defense of, RTO mandates is contributing to declining engagement, even among remote workers?

Clearly, some voices seemed to be convinced that remote work itself is to blame for declining employee engagement. Those in this school of thought espouse that employees will be happier, more productive, and more engaged when they are working in-person alongside their coworkers and when employees are visible to their bosses. And, so those who see remote work as causing lower engagement are advocating for more employees to be driven to RTO.

But is it possible that the calls for RTO, themselves, are leading to increased disengagement?

Consider that employees around the globe learned during the pandemic that a considerable number of office jobs could be effectively, and productively, performed remotely. On top of that, many employers signaled that they were going to embrace and support remote work. But, increasingly, companies are backtracking or even reversing course altogether.

Do such reversals and broken promises fracture employee trust and confidence in their leaders and their companies? And when exceptions to RTO are granted to some favored employees but not to others, isn't trust and confidence even further eroded?

I would argue that leaders who insist upon RTO with no more compelling data than "an echo chamber of like-minded CEOs who use their feelings and intuitions to make these pivotal decisions" may be a key source of decreased employee engagement.

Even for employees who still work remotely, watching business leaders across the country try to reassert control over employees has to be disheartening and discouraging. Indeed, much of the RTO mantra seems to reinforce the notion that the idea of employer-employee loyalty is only expected to run in one direction: it is the employee who is expected to swear fealty to the employer. But, employees themselves should not expect loyalty to be reciprocated.

What is the impact of that one-way loyalty on employee engagement? How does an employee commit their whole self, their authentic self, to a company who demands allegiance from them but offers none in return? How does this realization that some want to return to the employee-as-cog-in-the-machine impact other factors such as employee burnout and wellbeing?

Perhaps, it is the push for RTO - especially when some RTO mandates are "ridiculous, unnecessary and, in some instances, even cruel " - which is fueling the declines in employee engagement.

In honesty, I don't think we have compelling data one way or another. However, I do think we need to be open to the possibility that the manner in which RTO is being implemented - especially forced RTO - that could be a major contributor to declining employee engagement.

(Note, I am suggesting that it is the manner in which RTO is being pushed and imposed upon employees that may be to blame, not working in-person, per se. Many companies which allow employees to choose how, when, and where to work in office have found ways to maintain employee trust and confidence.)