Remote Work Is the New Signing Bonus | The Wall Street Journal

As a large segment of white-collar and knowledge-based workers state they are not willing to return to corporate offices full-time, many firms are using flexibility as a perk to poach talented people. This article describes how remote work has become the new signing bonus—where workers are enticed by the guarantee of flexible schedules and continued work from home rather than financial incentives. And as organizations provide their employees with greater detail and clarity on return-to-office plans, many reports show that this will prompt employees to leave their organization in search of greater flexibility. As a result, firms can consider two immediate implications:  1) Organizations with difficulty attracting top talent and diverse candidates can “promote” flexibility and remote work as a core component of their employer value proposition. 2) Firms should quickly assess the retention risk of their key employees, identify what influences their engagement and desire to stay or leave the organization, and develop a plan to retain these workers; a “stay conversation/interview” can support this effort. For more on stay interviews, you can check out this previous post.