“This isn’t just about productivity metrics,” Uber’s chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi recently told employees, after announcing that all staff should work from the office at least three days a week. “It’s about building the culture that will drive Uber’s next phase of growth.” Similarly, Amazon’s CEO Andy Jassy required his workforce to return to a five-day office routine in January, arguing that “people riff on top of one another’s ideas better when they’re together.” Such appeals to the elusive notion of company culture have become common among executives eager to bring employees back through the office doors.

While company culture is a slippery and often vague concept, research shows that a firm’s values and working norms significantly influence innovation, profitability and even stock market performance. But does mandating office presence actually strengthen culture? Our analysis suggests the answer depends on the kind of culture a company seeks to nurture.

Many bosses insist that full-time office attendance fuels creativity and collaboration. For instance, a Microsoft study of 61,000 employees found that remote working in early 2020 made the company more “siloed” and less “dynamic.” Furthermore, integrating new hires proves challenging when colleagues aren’t physically present to help them settle in.

Yet nearly all employees prefer to work from home at least some of the time. Research by Mark Ma of the University of Pittsburgh and others found that firms enforcing a return to office after the pandemic suffered declines in job satisfaction and increases in staff turnover, without any corresponding gains in company performance.
To investigate further, we combined data from CultureX - a research firm analysing corporate culture based on nearly 900 firms’ employee reviews on Glassdoor—and Work Forward’s Flex Index, which tracks remote-work policies across more than 13,000 employers. The Flex Index classifies firms into three groups: full-time office, fully flexible, and hybrid.

Our findings reveal that companies demanding five days a week in the office score higher on “agility” - the ability to anticipate and respond swiftly to market changes. Charlie Sull of CultureX explains, “If you’re in the office, you receive information more quickly and can adapt faster.”

However, on other important measures, the same firms scored worse. Employees rated them lower on supportiveness (feeling cared for by managers), quality of leadership, workplace toxicity, openness and work-life balance. On three other culture indicators, office mandates made little difference.

Of course, the analysis has limitations. It’s possible that companies less committed to supportive leadership or reducing toxicity also resist flexible work arrangements. Nonetheless, the data are telling. Don Sull, professor at MIT Sloan School of Management, notes that highly agile companies like NVIDIA, SpaceX and Tesla offer excellent pay and career prospects, but often at the expense of work-life balance.

More than five years after the pandemic began, organisations are still seeking the right balance between office and remote work. As labour markets cool and employer power grows, some bosses may push for more in-person time, citing cultural benefits. For firms prioritising agility, this strategy may pay off - but the evidence suggests it comes with notable costs to employee wellbeing and workplace satisfaction.

Ultimately, the office debate is not merely about where people work, but about what kind of culture companies want to cultivate - and what employees are willing to accept in return.