Silicon Valley companies find remote work is easier to begin than end as they look to bring employees back to the office

Technology companies that led the charge into remote work as the pandemic unfurled are confronting a new challenge as the crisis winds down: how, when and even whether they should bring long-isolated employees back to offices that have been designed for teamwork. Key points: Tech companies led the charge at the beginning of the pandemic for remote working Some believe that employees clustered together in a physical space will foster innovation and brainstorming Many employees are looking to hybrid-model work set-ups "I thought this period of remote work would be the most challenging year-and-half of my career, but it's not," said Brent Hyder, the chief people officer for business software maker Salesforce and its roughly 65,000 employees worldwide. Big tech look to bring people back into offices But the biggest tech companies, which have profited even more than Zoom as the pandemic made their products indispensable for many workers, aren't giving employees much choice in the matter. Reasons for heading to the office Camaraderie and the need to separate work from home are among the top reasons employees at business software maker Adobe Software cite for coming back to the office, said Gloria Chen, chief people officer for one of Silicon Valley's older companies. Flexible work arrangements used to lure execs to smaller firms The transition from the pandemic should enable smaller tech companies to adopt more flexible work-from-home policies that may help them lure away top-notch engineers from other firms more insistent on having people in the office, says Ms Boudreau, the Columbia University scholar.