The future of working from home in the public sector: What does the evidence tell us?

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic created a working from home experiment for the public sector. This paper examines what might happen next as countries move towards a COVID-normal environment. Since the academic literature on public sector agencies and working from home since the onset of the pandemic is scant, we focus on the non-peer-reviewed literature as our evidence base. This paper identifies the main issues public sector agencies need to consider as new ways of working emerge. The key facets are emerging preferences for hybrid working, productivity and remote working, and impacts of working from home on employees, especially gender equality. We highlight a range of emerging challenges, including how to maintain productivity, the need to redevelop employee value propositions to attract and retain employees in this changing landscape, and the risks of proximity bias. We conclude by identifying questions to be addressed in subsequent research.