As we step into 2025, the way we work continues to evolve. For many employers, home and hybrid working has become integral to the modern workplace, and ensuring your business adapts effectively is key to maintaining compliance, productivity, and employee satisfaction. In this newsletter, we’ll explore what your organisation needs to consider when managing home and hybrid working arrangements in 2025 and beyond.
1. Review and Update Contractual Arrangements
To accommodate home or hybrid working arrangements, it is essential to review your employees’ contracts. Consider the following:
Clarity in Work Locations: Specify where employees are normally expected to work, whether permanently in the office or at home, or a mix of both. If the latter, as part of your Hybrid arrangement, you may wish to specify the minimum amount of time that should be spent on site each week/month, and, if necessary, the actual days of week that should be spent in the office. Include provisions for changes in work location.
Working Hours and Availability: Clearly define working hours and expectations around availability, e.g. core working hours, to prevent misunderstandings and promote work-life balance.
Expenses and Equipment: Detail how work-related expenses and equipment needs (e.g., laptops, internet costs) will be reimbursed and provided.
Regularly review and update your contracts to ensure they reflect your operational needs, and comply with UK employment law.
2. Develop Robust Policies for Home and Hybrid Working
A well-crafted policy is critical to managing remote working arrangements effectively. Your policies should:
Set Expectations: Outline expectations for performance, communication and collaboration.
Include a Trial Period: If introducing hybrid working, consider a trial phase to assess the suitability of the arrangement for both parties.
Ensure Inclusivity: Address how you will accommodate your employee’s needs, such as disability adjustments, to create equitable working conditions.
Our team can assist in drafting or reviewing your home and hybrid working policies to ensure they align with best practice and legal requirements.
3. Prioritise Health and Safety Compliance
Health and safety obligations extend to employees working remotely. Key steps include:
Conducting Risk Assessments: Evaluate home working environments for risks, ensuring employees have ergonomic setups and safe working conditions. Initially, this relies on employees undertaking their own work station risk self-assessment, which should then be looked at and reviewed in case it identifies problems. Make sure that employees understand the fire risks involved in operating electrical equipment, along with well-placed smoke detectors. Employers may wish to provide appropriate fire extinguishers, particularly for those employees that primarily work from home, along with a good adjustable office chair.
Providing Training: Equip employees with the knowledge to maintain a healthy and safe home workspace, and an ergonomically sound work station. This is really important for new and younger employees who have not had the opportunity to work from home before.
Regular Reviews: Reassess remote working conditions periodically, and provide support where needed, especially if people actually move home which will impact on their work station arrangement.
ailure to meet these obligations can lead to significant risks for your business.
4. Manage Home and Hybrid Workers Effectively
Managing remote teams requires a shift in approach. Consider these strategies:
Foster Communication: Use technology to ensure regular communication and collaboration, such as video calls and team messaging platforms. Schedule regular 1-1s and team meetings when people are already coming into the office, individually or together, or have meetings when some people are in person and others participate virtually. The latter requires real communication and interpersonal skills to make sure no one feels excluded, and successfully managing matters when several people want to talk at once.
Monitor Output, Not Hours: Focus on performance and outcomes rather than micromanaging working hours.
Encourage Connection: Organise team-building activities and in-person meetups to maintain a sense of belonging, organisational culture that should help to minimise feelings of loneliness or detachment from the team.
Provide Manager Training: Equip Managers with the skills to lead remote and hybrid teams effectively. This is something we can offer, so feel free to call us to discuss how we can tailor training to help Managers manage hybrid teams successfully.
Let Us Support You
Navigating the complexities of home and hybrid working can be challenging, but you don’t have to do it alone. Our team of HR experts are here to help with:
Drafting and reviewing contracts and policies
Giving input into health and safety assessments
Providing management training and ongoing support
Any questions that you may have!
If you’d like to discuss how we can support your business in adapting to home and hybrid working in 2025, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. Here’s to a productive year ahead!
Clients are welcome to raise any concerns with our Consultant team, who would be pleased to advise you on any element of the issues arising from this newsletter.