What Is the Difference Between Hybrid, Agile and Flexible Working?

The modern workplace is constantly evolving to meet the needs of its workforce. Businesses have adopted a more flexible approach to minimise limitations and maximise efficiency. In turn, this helps to improve motivation and productivity amongst current employees, while attracting and retaining new talent, too.

Often terms used interchangeably, agile, hybrid and flexible working are all different models that organisations today have favoured to benefit the health and well-being of their staff and aid business success.

This article will help to explain these different models and highlight key workplace design considerations to support them.

What is Hybrid Working?

Hybrid working provides the best of both worlds; it gives employees the option to split their time between working in the office and working remotely. There is no hard and fast rule about what the ratio of this split needs to be, meaning it will differ from business to business. As such, their office design needs to reflect this accordingly. 

In some cases, companies have chosen to downsize their office as most of their workforce spends a considerable amount of time working from home. Others have decided to remain in their existing office but reconfigure the space to account for a fluctuating headcount. 

For hybrid working, there are still fixed desks available for employees to work from, with many businesses utilising a desk booking system so they can track the occupancy and support staff in the office accordingly. 

Key considerations for workplaces adopting the hybrid working model are:

• Shared collaborative areas
• Quiet areas / pods
• Meeting rooms that can support video conferencing to connect to colleagues and clients remotely
• Access to storage space

What is Flexible Working?

While hybrid working focuses on where an employee works from, the flexible working model refers to when they work and how their traditional working hours might be adjusted to better suit a work/life balance, particularly as more and more people are working remotely.

When it comes to office design, it’s important to provide employees with the support and resources they need so they can find the best solution to suit their working hours. It must provide employees with different places and ways to work – for example, dedicated areas to replicate a home environment for those who prefer to work remotely. 

Similar to hybrid working, this can be achieved through the inclusion of collaboration stations and dedicated meeting rooms, where employees can work together in this same space. This must also be supported by the ability to video call team members and clients working remotely when required. 

What is Agile Working?

Those who adopt an agile working approach view work as an activity rather than being tied down to any particular place in the office. This attitude allows employees to feel more in control of their own work schedule so that they become more productive, which goes hand-in-hand with job satisfaction and business success. 

Agile working aims to give employees a dynamic workplace designed to inspire and adapt to different working styles. For future-proofing purposes, agile workplaces often have customisable features so they can be easily updated when required. Hot desking and ergonomics play important roles in a modern agile working environment as a way of fitting a workplace to suit the needs of the employee rather than the other way around.

Businesses are more open to change now than ever before. Particularly following the pandemic, they are adapting at an exponential rate in a bid to create a happy, healthy workplace for their employees. 

Whether you are focusing on just one working model or applying parts of all three to your business, the experts at Ashlar can help. We provide the full package when it comes to refurbishments and fit-outs – we work closely with you to design, plan and fit an office space tailored to the exact needs of you and your employees. To find out more, simply give us a call today.