Link To Guest Website: https://www.marczlegal.com/

Title: “Bringing Employees Back To The Office This Summer”
Guest: Marc Zwetchkenbaum – Marc Z Legal Staffing
Interviewer: Jeffrey Davis – MAGE LLC

Click here to read the transcript
Jeffrey (1s):
Well, welcome back everyone. Again, my name is Jeffrey Davis. I’m the host of Radio Entrepreneurs. I’m also chairman of the board and founder of Mage LLC a management consulting firm in Boston since 1985. And you know, I get excited Just every week when that face comes on my screen. That means it must be the Marc Z moment. Welcome Marc Z from Marc Z Legal staffing. Hi Marc!

Marc (28s):
Jeff. Great to be here. Great to see you. I missed you when you had John, although John’s great. There’s there’s only one Jeffrey Davis.

Jeffrey (37s):
I would beg to differ, you know, John Friedman. We’re definitely bookends who work well together and I appreciate the compliment, but Marc, I know you’ve been really focusing on this whole concept of back to work and what it means for employers and you know what it does. It affects so many things, culture, the work environment, recruiting everything. So, you know, let’s get into it. What’s up.

Marc (1m 4s):
So, you know, the interesting, if you talked about a month and a half ago to employers, they would say, we’re still figuring it out. We’re going to be flexible. We don’t have our plan yet. Hopefully we’ll know more in the fall. It could be to next year. And then as soon as the regulations were lifted, Biden made the announcement in terms of shots in arms, the restrictions were now will officially lifted or going to be lifted in the state. Things have now changed. Employers are now saying, let’s start back to work now. And so what a lot of employers are doing, they’re saying, you know what?

Marc (1m 46s):
This is, these are the firms and what firms or companies that have had people working remotely. There’s some firms like personal injury firms or residential real estate firms that really after the initial stay in place, had people working full-time socially distance. So a lot of this tool firms have had that, but now the, the firms that have had the traditional workforce in other disciplines, the major firms, the major professional services, corporations, universities, organizations of all kind it’s.

Marc (2m 27s):
Now, you know what? We like people to come back to work at least one to two days a week, starting in July, July 1st, then they’re looking at, you know what? We’d like to strongly encourage people to come back to work two days a week in August, and then by September three days a week. And then we’ll see between now and the end of the year, what we’re going to do. So that’s the one, the one thing they’re still not saying mandatory comeback, but what they’re saying, we strongly encourage. Now the con on that, a lot of people are saying I would in the workforce.

Marc (3m 11s):
Well, that’s giving mixed signals. If you strongly encourage it’s AKA mandatory, but a lot of employers are sort of trying to do a balancing act because they’re, they’re watching the legalities involved because it’s a minefield in terms of mandatory and strongly encourage as well as people that have religious and health objections. So that’s one thing employers are dealing with. The other thing is that starting to percolate percolate under the reservoir is, is the case of attorneys were professionals that say, I don’t want to come back.

Marc (3m 53s):
I want to continue to work. Totally remote and organizations, companies and law firms are saying, look, if they can produce and they can do this work for right now, we’re more than fine for them to work remotely. But in terms of staff, employers don’t have that same tact. In fact, we’ve had situations where originally employers say, look, as long as they could do one or two days a week, we’re fine. We found a really good candidate. And then the employers started were they fast track the candidate? And all of a sudden the employer has said to us, well, what can she really commit to? And the candidates said, I can commit to two days a week in the office three days a week outside.

Marc (4m 37s):
Cause she lived outside of the state. And now they’re saying, you know what? Let’s put a hold on it for now and let’s see who else is available. So employers are really encouraging non-attorneys to come back.

Jeffrey (4m 52s):
Well, I think that’s interesting. I, you know, I was just listening to stories this morning and I have been talking to clients. I have one client that’s requiring everybody. You write a process to get back into the office by October 1st. And so there’s working a process to October, but they are doing except exceptions to the rule. So they are speaking to employees who really seem to have been, become more productive outside of being in the office. And I think that’s something employers need to look at who really did benefit by being more productive through COVID because why would you want to bring them back to the office if they’re doing better?

Marc (5m 28s):
Right. Right. It’s a, it’s a balancing act. A lot does get lost by not being in the office, depending on what type of business you have. I mean, you’ve, you’ve been able to, you’re like a magician you’ve been able to, I know your business is on fire and you have your whole team working remote in my business. It can only help to a certain point. I mean, we were able to get everybody properly working remote, but at the same time, it’s not the same, a lot does get lowest. And that’s something we’re strongly encouraging. And we’re going to look into, as far as our company look for a remote, a remote in-office hybrid model, right?

Marc (6m 18s):
I’ve been back to meetings. Some clients have said it’s much better. And I’ve noticed the difference when you do get into some face to face meetings. Marc, I think it’s a big topic. If someone’s looking for you for their Marc Z moment, how would they find you? First of all, Google Marc Z Marc and the letter Z. And we come up right away, go to our website. Marc Z legal.com, M a R C Z Ellie gal.com and 6 1 7 3 3 8.

Jeffrey (6m 48s):
Thank you, Marc. I look forward to speaking to you. And again, every remind our listeners, Marc Z will be on Radio Entrepreneurs every week. You can find him and these moments of how to deal with personnel culture, organizational development. Thanks, Marc. Yeah, right.

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