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Parents say “No” to the office
The pandemic has affected people in a variety of ways. Most of white-collar America had to stay home for the past year to help snuff out the raging coronavirus. (Unfortunately, blue collar America had to stay working in person, which is another story for another day). This meant almost everyone that could, worked from their home. This caused a lot of chaos but also opened the door to a new way of working that many had never done before. Thankfully, the technology was there for us to do this with ease. If this had happened 10 or 20 years ago, I am not sure that would have been the case.
My wife and I were lucky. We have two teenagers, a junior and senior in high school. They were already self-sufficient when it came to doing their classes and schoolwork and the pandemic was not a big lift for us. But, I felt awful for my co-workers that had young children. I saw and heard many kids in zoom calls over the past year. But every single parent I talked to, especially the women, do not want to go back to the office in any meaningful way. They want the flexibility to stay home and care for their kids and work at the same time.
When you step back from this crisis you see people fall into several different buckets. Those that want to go back to the office. Those that want to stay home and work and those that want some type of hybrid model. These groups closely align with…
