Google is the latest big tech company to lay out plans for employees to return to work.
CEO Sundar Pichai says down the line, the company anticipates that about 60% of workers will come into the office a few days a week and work remotely the rest of the time, with 20% working from new locations and another 20% working remotely.
The company says this plan aligns with the patterns they have seen in parts of the world where they have already reopened offices.
That makes Google the latest in a series of large companies now committing to allow most workers to work away from the office at least part time.
Surveys have shown that people who have the option to work remotely will embrace that option, but not everyone wants to work from a resort or vacation home.
"That’s well suited to many people. Other people maybe prefer more of a separation between work and play,” said Dr. Patricia Mokhtarian, professor and engineer at the Georgia Institute of Technology who studies travel patterns.
“But I think the key going forward is just more flexibility than we’ve had before, and so ideally people can find what works best for them."
She believes that as restrictions ease and we put the pandemic behind us, people may find themselves going back to their normal routine more than they expected.
“What people say they expect to do a year from now, today, is I think an upper bound. So I think we’ll continue to see a bit of an erosion back to pre-pandemic levels. But there is no question in my mind that there will still be more telecommuting after we’re ‘back to normal’ than before.”
The increased flexibility and options means she expects a shift in commute patterns, with people changing their hours to avoid heavy traffic and potentially continuing to avoid public transit.
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