Work from home advice ending, but most offices won't order employees to return full-time

The Cabinet will likely scrap the advice to work from home in a press conference this evening, but most employers don't plan on forcing employees to come back to the office full time. Many employers will do the return to on-site working step by step, and then for only half of the week, NU.nl reports after speaking with large companies and the central government.

Ahold, ING, and Achmea said their employees would work in-office half the time and from home the other half. Ahold said the office would be for collaboration and home for concentrated work and meetings.

KPN, with 8,000 employees who can work from home, said its employees will be allowed to work from home 60 percent of the time. The company is currently "looking for balance."

The central government, with 75,000 employees able to work from home, will have people come into the office occasionally.

NS, with 5,000 people working from home, seems to leave it up to the employee to decide whether they want to work from home or at the office. Employees are already welcome at the office if their mental well-being demands it, NS said. "Whether or not employees want to work from home depends on personal preferences," the rail company said.

"In a general sense, employees are not eager to go back to the office," Mark van Vugt, professor of psychology at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam who is researching working from home, said to NU.nl. "Most only want to go back for a reason, and it's up to the employer to give that reason."

He called it a utopia to let employees decide whether or not they want to work in the office. "But in this time of staff shortages, the employer no longer has full control. Employees can make more demands, including that they prefer to work from home."

Van Vught stressed that a hybrid-working policy must be inclusive. "Where you do not discriminate against employees on their preference for work at home or a the office, for example by promoting the visible employee earlier."