Embracing Tomorrow's Work Environments: Workplace Flexibility Redefined with Rob Sadow, CEO of Scoop - ep. 066

In this episode, Rick and Kaleem have a conversation to explore the landscape of hybrid work with Rob Sadow, CEO of Scoop, a company empowering hybrid employees to make great decisions on how and where to spend their time.

The trio explores Rob’s impressive background, his current position as the CEO of Scoop, his remarkable career with Bain and Company, and his graduation from the Wharton School of Business. Rob details the influence of his past ventures on his problem-solving approach and Scoop's evolution propelled by the pitfalls faced by most companies during the pandemic, shifting its trajectory to address the need for adaptability and comprehensive planning addressing new commuting challenges in the face of evolving work dynamics.

The topic broadens to the need for more planning for hybrid work and the hesitancy among companies about the permanence of remote work. Rob stresses the need to redefine the office experience for hybrid workers by shifting from synchronous to asynchronous work practices, illustrating how Scoop's software incorporates tools like Slack and Google Calendar to streamline workspace planning for effective hybrid work. The conversation delves into the impact of flexibility on older and newer companies and the challenges faced by established executives in embracing novel remote work paradigms.

Insights gleaned from the Flex Index data are revealed, showcasing the decline in companies adhering to a full-time in-office work structure and the increasing embrace of work location flexibility. Rob highlights the trends toward flexibility and the inevitable shift toward more adaptable work environments, projecting that over 80% of U.S. companies will offer location flexibility for corporate workers in the future! Moreover, the discussion encompasses the challenges posed by leadership nostalgia, with established executives finding it challenging to pivot from traditional in-office approaches. Rob emphasizes the necessity for empathy towards these leaders and the slower adoption of new work paradigms.

Amidst the professional discourse, Rob shares a humorous yet thought-provoking personal anecdote involving his wife's calm text about contractions during a remote meeting, illustrating the blurred lines between personal and professional life in remote work settings.

A capsule focused on a comprehensive exploration of the trends, challenges, and the future of hybrid work. Rob's experience and Scoop's trajectory in the face of the changing landscape highlight the significance of adaptability, intentionality, and comprehensive planning to navigate the evolving realm of remote and flexible work environments. Tune in to gain some valuable insights into the evolving definitions of hybrid work, flexibility's role, and the challenges faced by companies in embracing this transition straight from a master on adaptability. Thank you for joining us, Rob!

Learn more about Rob:

• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/rob-sadow/
• Webpage - https://www.scoopforwork.com/
• Flex Perspectives Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/flex-perspectives/id1679987888

Transcript

Rob: 0:35

I am from near where you live, Kaleem, if I understand correctly. I'm from Atlanta. I'm from Sandy Springs.

Kaleem: 0:42

Get the hell out of here. How do we know this? How did you, are you around the corner? Okay. So, I'm going to say Atlanta, Georgia, because when you lived here, it was Atlanta, wasn't it?

Rob: 0:53

it was Atlanta. I'm trying to remember when it became Sandy Springs, right? But definitely when I was growing up, it was definitely Atlanta.

Kaleem: 0:59

It was 100 percent Atlanta.

Rick: 1:01

a second. Did it change?

Rob: 1:03

Sandy Springs kind of... I don't know if there's a good word for it almost like seceded. It's like, they, they like seceded from atlanta

Kaleem: 1:09

you know better. We can't say succeed in the South. I'm from the North, son. We're from the North. You can't say that in 2023. Succeed?

Rick: 1:18

No. Succeed.

Kaleem: 1:19

Oh, shit.

Rick: 1:20

Succeed. We can't succeed! We ain't succeeding!

Kaleem: 1:28

It's not being successful. It's departure.

Rob: 1:31

favorite quote so far is Kaleem, there is no success in 2023. There,

Rick: 1:37

That's very true. He speaks for all of us.

Kaleem: 1:39

So the South did not succeed back in the old days when they tried to leave the Union.

Rick: 1:45

The South did not succeed in succession. Welcome back to Remotely One. I am your co host, Rick Haney, joined by an amped and very nervous esteemed colleague, Kaleem Clarkson. Am I right?

Kaleem: 2:04

Hello, sir. I'm trying to bow sitting down. I'm trying to bow sitting

Rick: 2:08

Take your Ritalin, man, take your Ritalin. Calm down,

Kaleem: 2:11

hey, hey, I can't help it, sir. I can't help it. I'm all geeked up for these guests. All geeked up.

Rick: 2:15

We're gonna have a great conversation today. But first, listeners and viewers, since you know how to find us, please do us a huge favor and go to ratethispodcast. com forward slash remotely one. Just leave us a review. That would be amazing. We would really appreciate it. Since 2015, Remotely One has been one of the largest communities of remote work professionals with over 3, 000 Slack members and 5, 000 email subscribers. It's free to join, so go check it out at remotelyone. com. And with that out of the way, Kaleem, give us a tease or two about today's guest. I see you revving up over

Kaleem: 2:52

Oh my gosh. the challenge is every week when we get on these, I'm excited to talk to these people nervous, but then I'm depressed because I'm like, what the hell am I doing with my life? Rick? Like, what the hell am I doing?

Rick: 3:06

What are you doing with your life? That's a conversation for after the show.

Kaleem: 3:10

let's do that. But listen, today, we just found out that our guest is from the Peach State. A. K. A. Georgia. Not only that, it was formerly known as Sandy Springs. That's where I'm at! He's from where I'm at right now! Unbelievable. Guest, I didn't even ask you. Guest, where are you currently residing?

Rob: 3:30

I'm in Brooklyn now.

Kaleem: 3:32

Brooklyn Zoo! Shame on you when you step through to Old Dirty Bastion, Brooklyn! I see you. I see you. What else? Our guest today. Here we go, Rick. Here we go again. Some people that know some things went to the University of Penn and went to the Wharton School of Business.

Rick: 3:53

big time.

Kaleem: 3:54

Yeah, it is. Yeah, it is. I believe, I believe that might be our second or third Wharton School of Business alum. Let's see. Oh, Just another minor thing that our guest has done. They Worked for one of the big three or aka MBB's Banning company just a small consultant firm in case you haven't heard of them Being in company.

Rick: 4:19

This is the sound of me becoming slowly intimidated.

Kaleem: 4:22

Yeah. Yeah, I'm already nerved up. He knows how to make PowerPoints, dude. Big time.

Rick: 4:28

Slide decks.

Rob: 4:29

Is there any more important skill

Kaleem: 4:32

so many slide decks just slanging slide decks Oh Rick Rick Our guest, they can't stand hot dogs. Is that American?

Rick: 4:42

Hold on. This changes everything.

Kaleem: 4:45

Can't stand hot dogs.

Rick: 4:47

You call yourself an American, friend?

Kaleem: 4:51

Oh, and guess what? And also does not like cheese on their pizza. No cheese on the pizza.

Rick: 4:57

In Brooklyn?

Kaleem: 4:59

Oh my God. That makes it so

Rick: 5:00

How do you get away with that shit in Brooklyn?

Rob: 5:03

I don't publicize it,

Rick: 5:06

Hey, Paisano over here doesn't like cheese on his pizza. Let's show

Kaleem: 5:09

what's the dude even doing? And what's he doing? Okay. Um, our guest is also a LinkedIn top voice on flexible work. Shout out to you guests. Our guest is the co founder and CEO of scoop and scoop build software for remote and hybrid companies. Companies that use their software Rick meta and Microsoft just to name a few just a little bit.

Rick: 5:37

No big deal.

Kaleem: 5:38

No big freaking deal.. Oh scoop. Also has created this awesome product that I check out all the time, which is called the flex index, which has over 7, 500 companies at which they categorize their workplace flexibility. So if you want to know how flexible a company is, you can go to the flex index and see how flexible that company is.

Rick: 6:03

That's a major flex in and of itself. I just created your company tagline.

Kaleem: 6:07

Oh, it's a, oh, he smokes. Change it now. Listeners and viewers, please give a warm welcome to Rob. Say let's go! Woo! Settle down. Settle down.

Rob: 6:28

I feel like I can't live up to that introduction. It was like better than anything I'm going to say over the next, however long we talk,

Kaleem: 6:34

settle down audience. Yes, it is. Sit your ass down crowd. Thank you for joining us, Rob. Appreciate you.

Rick: 6:41

Yeah. Yeah. No, this is a long time coming. We're excited to learn a lot from you, Rob. We're glad you could join us. I want to start out by asking you if, can you expand a little bit on your experience with Bain and company, first of all, and how it kind of prepared you for entrepreneurship.

Rob: 7:01

I'm just glad you didn't ask me to expand on my experience with hot dogs, which is, I thought what was going to be the first question, but

Rick: 7:07

I thought we determined we were not going to discuss this anymore,

Rob: 7:10

we will not talk about

Kaleem: 7:11

I wasn't going to ask you if you don't like apple pie, Rob. We're in in this damn podcast right now. Do you like apple pie?

Rob: 7:19

think I think it's like a setting on Riverside that if I told you I didn't like hot dogs and American pie, it would just shut off. You know, you Just violated terms of service. You can't continue to record on this platform.

Kaleem: 7:29

Rob, don't answer that question. Plead the fifth, please, because we want to continue the show.

Rick: 7:35

Yeah.

Rob: 7:36

uh, Rick, answer your question. I started out my career at Bain. So I started at Bain in New York office in 2008. I worked there for 6. 5 years across New York. And, San Francisco, hugely formative for me in my career. A couple of reasons. One taught me how to think in a way that I didn't quite experience in college in particular around how do you break down problems into like little bits to then think about what you do to solve them. So like, what question do you ask? What work do you have to do? How do you communicate around it? So, you know, Bain's really good. I think consulting firms broadly are really good at teaching you how to like break down stuff into digestible chunks. And that, I think, is like a really helpful thing in startups broadly, is like how do you take big problems and turn them into small problems that you can figure out how to solve. The other is Bain had a program, I think they still have this program when I was there, called an externship. wHere you can go work at another company for six months and then come back to Maine. And so in 2010, I went and worked at a startup in Israel for six months in Tel Aviv. And it was my first exposure to startups and how to think about entrepreneurship, had a huge impact on the way that I thought about my career afterward. I likely would never have started Scoop without that experience, and BAME was super formative to me in a bunch of different ways.

Rick: 8:53

Amazing. So do you remember like, any of the most ridiculous interview questions that they asked you?

Rob: 9:00

Uh, there are so many case study type questions, market size this, like how do you think about? I feel like the, I remember the studying the examples was worse, I think, than the actual questions would be like, how many ping pong balls do you? think you could fit in a 747 or like how many hotel rooms get booked in the U. S. each year? That stuff is hard. I'm not sure how valuable it is, but it does, I guess, show your way to kind of like break down approaches to problems to some extent.

Kaleem: 9:25

I saw one where somebody said, how many pigs are there? That was the question. I was like, what? Like that's, what do you mean?

Rob: 9:34

I always, I always felt like my initial reaction to that, by the way, Colleen was like. There's like a two second period where? my head explodes and I'm like, what, what was that question? Like, how do you think about it? And then you kind of like take a deep breath and try and break down the steps. But at first you're just like, what? Like, you know, and then, and then you have to work through it.

Kaleem: 9:52

That's pigs. Um, so moving like kind of a little bit into your career and moving further out, I noticed that you also join the association, for commuter transportation or act. It's really curious because not very many people even know that that association exists or what it even does. And I had an opportunity to speak at that conference last year on a panel. So I'm just curious. Can you just kind of tell an audience like what that is about. And then out of curiosity, why were you interested in joining that association?

Rob: 10:26

Yeah. It's a pretty good deep find by the way. And, uh, it is related to a chapter of Scoop's history that you actually may not know anything about. So, I started Scoop in 2015 with my brother. So my brother is my co founder. As I told you, he lives probably down the street from you in Atlanta. And, our experience growing up, our high school was 25 miles away from where we live. So we went to high school in College Park, Right. and grew up in St. Springs. So we would drive 250 miles a week back and forth to school. A huge impact on the way I thought about how you spend your time and life. And in 2015, when we originally started to build a company, we built it to help solve commute problems. And we built software to enable employees to share trips back and forth to the workplace, to improve outcomes for companies around how they use their real estate or recruiting or retaining employees that have long commute trips. and actually built a pretty sizable company around that I joined, act as part of that work because we were, I was engaging with a lot of companies they're involved with. I was on the board for a period of act. So in some ways, scoops chapter one from 2015 to, I guess the pandemic was all commute focused. And act was part of that.

Kaleem: 11:41

Wow. Wow. Yeah, they do some really interesting work there as far as, there's a whole field that manages how cities are mobilized, how people, Travel throughout cities, whether it's driving, whether it's walking, whether it's biking, and there's government agencies that design all that it's really intense. And it's a whole industry that I didn't even know existed and it's kind of intense. You have business partnerships, with government entities. So it's, it is pretty fascinating. What goes into, for example, carpooling. Like creating the carpool lane, the amount of like effort that it takes to even do that was pretty fascinating. Anyway, I saw that on there. I was just like, Holy smokes. And he's part of act. Like, you don't hear that too often.

Rob: 12:27

You're like, where did that come from?

Rick: 12:29

Yeah. So Rob, I'm a guy that likes to have conversations with people about their roots, beginnings and that kind of thing. And I'm curious about some of yours, you know, what inspired you to pursue a career and work flexibility? And was there a kind of an aha moment in your earlier years that? Convinced you that to pursue, a better balance, so to speak.

Rob: 12:53

You know, I don't think it was in my early years. It was pretty formative actually through the pandemic. And I'll tell you a couple of things that kind of happened to me in that time period. You know, in 2020, obviously a lot of people got exposed to remote work for the first time that hadn't previously been exposed to it. For Scoop as a company, it led to some really interesting and at the time, very difficult challenges, right? Because we were, we had built this commute solution that was used by lots of different companies. A lot of those companies, went home, so there's no commute trips. And we basically, and we could spend a whole other hour talking about how this happened, but we basically had to make a decision. Which is. Are we going to hunker down and wait and see when the commute is going to come back? Or are we going to pursue what started to emerge as an interesting evolution in the way we think about work, which was flexible working, right. And that in some ways was my first exposure to it. And it happened through our customers who were saying, Hey, look, there's a chance that our employees may never come back to the office. And this is summer, fall 2020, and it was the first time I'd ever really thought about that before. So, we found that problem really interesting in the sense that there's a chance that hybrid work could accomplish more in terms of reducing commute trips than people not going into the office five days a week than we ever could have accomplished in all of the effort we were doing in carpooling and building software for commute trips. And that was really appealing to us. And then the second thing that kind of happened was I had my first kid in 2021 and my wife got pregnant and at 2020, thank you very much. And I got a front row seat for the first time to how important flexibility is a different chapter to your life. When my wife was pregnant and the ability to work remote had a huge impact for her on her ability to take care of herself and her energy level when the baby came coming back from parental leave. I think she took four months off or so. So she came back in January 2022 being able to work remotely. incredibly impactful for her for feeding and rest and other things. Then she wanted to be able to go into an office more, and being hybrid was great. We just had our second kid a month ago, and we're kind of going back through that cycle, if you will. And you start to realize how important this is to people at different stages of their life. And that really started to connect with me personally around flexible work and what that means for participation in the workforce and career development and things like that in a way that I had never really directly experienced before.

Kaleem: 15:22

Wow. so scoop was dealing with the challenge of the commute originally, and then the pandemic hits and you decide we have to make a pivot to do something that's in relation to this workplace flexibility. At what point, like, In the pandemic, did you make the final call? I'm just curious, trying to get a timeline. At what point did you decide, okay, this is it. You call your brother. We're like, we got to do something where, you know, clients are telling us at what point did you finally flip the switch?

Rob: 15:55

It was 2020 and the way it kind of sequenced out was. You guys probably remember this, but at the beginning of the pandemic, people were like, hey, we're all going to be back in the office by June. And if you said like, we're going to be back in September, people would be like, why are you so negative? Like, what do you mean we're gonna be back in September? Like, we'll be back in June, you know? And then like every month that passed. It would like push out another three months and then when July came and you had that next wave and it was worse, you know, and so around August or September was the first time that we kind of sat down and we're like, Hey, look, there is no expiration date on COVID. Nobody knows. We just don't. Nobody understands the trend of this thing and like we can't plan around it. At the same time, as I was mentioning, we started to hear about flexible work and kind of like that idea. And we realized that not only was it a pretty heavy, like employee logistics problem, who's working, where planning I'm working, where, how do you coordinate that if people are hybrid, that's actually very closely linked to some capabilities that we had built on helping people share trips together and how do you manage employees and connect them to do those types of things? And so it felt like something that was somewhat close to home in that regard. And we could apply the skill set and technology that we had built to it. Right. And so late 2020, we made the call and, to be honest, guys, it was the, it is the hardest thing I ever had to do professionally and basically had to rip down a company that was pretty big, like at scoops largest in that phase, we were 200 people, you would, we'd raised a lot, a lot of capital and we effectively had to reboot the company as an early stage startup focusing on something different, and. You know, it took years to kind of work our way out of it. Obviously, I'm incredibly proud of where we are today and what we do in the business we're building. But there was some dark times and some really difficult challenges and kind of navigating through that transition.

Rick: 17:47

My goodness, I can't imagine. you for sharing that, by the

Kaleem: 17:50

yeah, seriously. Kudos to you for making that call. It's not easy.

Rob: 17:54

Thank you.

Rick: 17:55

Yeah, you mentioned the push for returning back to offices, but we're seeing all these return to office pushes lately, and I'm wondering how many people are being intentional in planning their office days, and if organizations really want people to, Utilize the office space. How does Scoop assist people on how to plan it?

Rob: 18:22

Yeah. so Intentionality, I think, is, maybe in, in short supply right now, I think, in terms of how a lot of people have approached hybrid work. Part of the reason I think that is, Rick, is because I think that there are still a bunch of executives who, in their heart of hearts, hope that this is a transitional phase on the way back to full time in office. And so you don't invest in it with the intensity that you would if you believe this is permanent and we've got to get better at this. I think that's evolving month to month and quarter to quarter. But to date, I think a lot of companies have still been saying, hey, look, we're going to try and boil the frog. Go from three days in the office, maybe in the future it's four days a week. Maybe then we can kind of transition back to full time and that changes the mentality around it. In reality, and we could talk about why this is. Hybrid work, I think, and flexible work is going to be the future. You know, we're seeing more and more companies vote that way. It's very important to employees, and we're seeing that pick up and continue to become more permanent. I think the two biggest gaps in intentionality around hybrid work today is When we get to the office or go to the office, what makes that a really valuable experience and how do I maximize the likelihood that that time together is going to be valuable because I'm with the right people doing the right things and it makes that commute trip worth it. In the first place. The second is I think people have not been intentional enough about the transition from synchronous work to asynchronous work that's required as part of moving toward more flexible work environments. And people still have too many remote stand ups and check ins and other types of meetings. There's a fascinating stat that I saw from Nick Bloom at Stanford, who does the WFH research that hybrid employees spend 50 percent of their time in meetings.

Kaleem: 20:14

Wow. Wow.

Rob: 20:16

It's way more than full time in office. It's way more than fully remote. It's because they're kind of one foot in each world and they haven't evolved intentionally their practices yet to start to adopt some of the things that maybe fully remote organizations have done in terms of asynchronous work and documentation and things like that. So we think those are the two biggest issues that we see. Where do you work in the intentionality around that? And how do you work in the intentionality around that? That's where we focus our Scoop software. We build software that is embedded into tools that you're already using. Slack, Google Calendar, Chrome, things like that, that make it really easy to see who's working where, planning on working where. So if you're going to go into the office, you can do that with confidence. You can organize your schedule around that and make sure it's going to be a valuable office day. And we have a new suite of tooling around meetings and how do you raise the bar on the quality of preparation and follow through on hybrid meetings and eliminate them when it's not there by centralizing some content in slack that right now is separated across calendar and zoom and docs and slack and bring more visibility to it in a way it's very powerful.

Rick: 23:30

Wow. Wow. So it seems to me, and maybe you would agree with this, but, It seems that we need a more clear definition of what hybrid work actually is. And... Would you consider, based on that, a four day work week, and four days in office as being hybrid?

Rob: 23:49

So I would,

Kaleem: 23:50

you would rob

Rob: 23:52

but I'll explain.

Kaleem: 23:53

four days in office. You're gonna say it is

Rob: 23:56

so I would, I would draw the distinction. Look, this is my opinion. Other people may disagree. Right. But I think that there, I'm not saying, by the way, that four days a week is what I think is necessarily the best model, right? But like, I think that anything right now that is short of spending five days a week in office, is a step in the direction of flexibility, right? Like that is some flexibility that maybe wasn't offered previously. I would include four days a week in that. To be clear, when we break it down and, and, one of the things, and Colleen you were talking about flex index at the beginning and some of the work we've done there. In order to kind Of bring together all of these policies and be able to provide some kind of reason as to what's happening, We spent an inordinate amount of time on trying to figure out how do you create definitions around this stuff in a way that people can lean on and at least be able to compare like for like. So I'll kind Of share a little bit on how we think about this in case it's helpful. We bracket it into like three main groups. There's full time in office, which is somewhat obvious, right? It's like you're expected to be in the office for All of your work hours, effectively five days a week or more. On the other side, there is what we call fully flexible. So when we say fully flexible, in my mind, that's a combination of two different types of companies. One is fully remote, have no offices. right. So fully flexible in that way. The other is what we call employee's choice. right. So employee can choose when or how often to go into the office. It's not required. Company does have offices, but you don't have to go there. In the middle is what we describe as structured hybrid. And that's when the company sets a specific expectation on when or how often you're supposed to go in the office. It can be a minimum number of days, two, three, four, as we talked about. It could be specific days like Wednesday, Thursday. Within those companies that are structured, 90 percent of them require two or three days a week. So four days a week is actually a pretty uncommon hybrid model, if you will. But I still would call it not full time in office, if that makes sense.

Kaleem: 25:55

Okay. So he blocked and bridged the question, Rick, just like a perfect, wonderful politician. He changed the words for use fully flexible, you know, and then, I mean, I love it. I love it. And he kept the flex back to flex index. I can vibe with that. Although I 100 percent disagree, Rob, I can vibe with that. To me, the definitions we came up with, because you remember. In like in all sports, you have like, you know, golf, more like golf, baseball, you hear the thing, spirit of the game and the spirit of the game, you know what I mean? Like these are kind of like unwritten rules, but they're, it supports the spirit of the true game. That's what I feel about hybrid. I feel like what you called flexible choice is the true spirit of hybrid. Flexible choice is in my opinion, the true spirit of hybrid and how we define it.

Rob: 26:53

flexible choice, you mean like you mean that full flexibility,

Kaleem: 26:55

Yeah, the full flexible where employees can choose, right? Because we agonized over this as well of like, do we use the number of times in office and do we actually use a centralized office as the other, variable when trying to come up with this? So we define hybrid as, some people commute to an office, right. And other people work remotely. So that could be any combination technically, right? Like, So back to your point. Four days in office technically could be hybrid, but then we started thinking about it. I was like, well, how could we define it on the other side? And when we said, okay, if a majority of your work week is spent in office, then you're just telecommuting.

Rob: 27:37

Hmm.

Kaleem: 27:38

Right.

Rob: 27:38

I, you know, I'll, I'll tell you, I think you are Right. in a sense, but the one thing I would add is, um.

Kaleem: 27:45

what if it's a four day work week?

Rob: 27:46

totally for exactly and it's interesting is that four day work week everybody's in the office and that's actually one of the more interesting discussions around 40 work weeks to begin with right is that is a four day work week? actually an increase in flexibility. I would argue It's not, it's just you're, you're not, you're decreasing the amount of work time in terms of the number of days. But it's not an increase in flexibility. It's actually in some ways a, decrease in flexibility for, for folks, right, But the thing that I think often people lose track of is, and look, especially for, you know, Colleen, you guys have been working on this stuff. And you've been thinking about it for a long, long time. Longer than a lot of people, right? Is that... For the vast majority of people, their first exposure to remote work and the term hybrid work didn't even really exist before the pandemic. right. If you like, go search the archive of Google News for hybrid work prior to 2020, nothing, nothing there, which is fascinating for a term that's become so ubiquitous. But for most people, they're 3. 5 years into this journey. And when you think about the adoption curve of anything, any new product or trend, that stuff takes years, if not decades. And so I think that four days a week in some ways may be just be a way station along the direction of where we go, right? And so in that way, I don't want to take away credit from the model because it is a step in a direction and may Not be the right ultimate outcome. But it's important to kind of acknowledge where we came from and where we're going on that and recognize that everyone's not going to get there immediately, just like no one gets there immediately on any trend.

Kaleem: 29:16

Yes. Yes. I 100% agree and I actually like the fact that you use flexible because that's the whole point you're. You're trying to group the flexibility, and hey, four days in office out of five that is flexible. It's not the most flexible, but there is some flexibility. So I know what you're saying, but we can agree to disagree, Rob. That's what we're here for. I mean, like we can't have a

Rob: 29:38

Totally.

Kaleem: 29:39

a good thing like that.

Rob: 29:41

I agree.

Rick: 29:42

Just don't start talking about hot dogs for crying out

Kaleem: 29:44

Oh my gosh, no hot dogs.

Rob: 29:46

that's out of, out of bounds territory. we can't talk about hot dogs.

Kaleem: 29:49

With, before we get to the question, I have one more question for you as far as what you're seeing. Trend wise. And I think you mentioned it before and I love the data that you know, the flex index puts out. It's really great. I've used it in my presentation. So thank you, sir. Appreciate you. yeah, yeah. Love posting data. Love that. Are you starting to see any changes? So. Kind of a two part question a do you go back and reassess the flexibility of companies at a certain period and then be? Have you seen the changes in that flexibility? And I guess see do you have like a report of those changes kind of like could you say X number of companies in this vertical were flexible this way and now they're flexible that way

Rob: 30:36

Yeah, totally. So one of the things that we do is we put out monthly reports, as you've mentioned, we call them flex reports. And. We started doing it in February 2023, the first time we put it out. Each one has a different theme. It could be what's going on in a particular geography, or what's happening in tech versus financial services versus retail, or what are big companies doing versus small companies. Sometimes we'll explore a number of those. Sometimes we'll go deep in one particular area. The couple of things that are relevant to what you're asking that I've seen are one across the U. S. We have seen a steady movement away from full time in office over the course of 2023 at the beginning of the year, 49 percent of US companies on an industry weighted basis were full time in office and our most recent data that's dropped to 38%. Of companies are now full time in office, and so you're seeing a steady pick up month to month in terms of the percentage of companies that require full time in office for corporate employees. That's it. It's a good movement in terms of like if you are expecting more flexibility, we are trending that way in terms of more and more flexibility month by month, quarter by quarter.

Kaleem: 31:46

that's interesting step

Rob: 31:47

the second thing That's really interesting about that is we started to look at how that varies. Based on when a company was started not just tech company any company when it was started and the thought process was Maybe the youngest companies started in the last five years ten years fifteen years actually adopt work location flexibility differently And we found kind of two dramatic pivot points It's in that in the kind of like history of companies, if you will, one was companies that were started post 2000 versus pre 2000, far more flexible. Part of the reason for that, I believe, is because, like, those are companies grew up with internet, right? Different kind of experience as you start your company. The second is companies that were founded post 2010 way more flexible than the ones that are founded pre 2010. That's the era of smartphone, slack, teams, zoom, right? Like the collaboration software has gotten way, way, way more developed in the last 15 years from where it was previously. If you look at those companies that were started in the last 15 years, 93 percent of them offer work location flexibility. Um, staggeringly high. Why is that really important? It's because While we've gone from 49 percent full time in office to 38 percent now, with each passing year, more companies will form. Those companies will form in a world where flexibility is much more common. Older companies will die out just as time passes. The U. S. For example, will become more flexible and we're seeing that trend month to month, quarter to quarter in our data.

Rick: 33:24

so based on your data, do you personally believe that flexibility is here to stay?

Rob: 33:31

I don't only think that it's here to stay? I think you're going to end up at a place where 80 percent plus of U. S. Companies offer work location flexibility, at least for corporate workers. And I think you're going to see a steady march to that year by year.

Kaleem: 33:43

Wow. Wow. So so geez, what I feel like is left out in your stat right there to me is those newer companies have not. Doesn't have less leadership, nostalgia and less ingrained in office, sit in your seat type mentality and older companies such as JP Morgan. I'm throwing you out there. Yeah. I'm saying the names, but like some of these older companies have a lot more difficult time adjusting to this. This newness. It's just really interesting that you're saying that an 80 percent you feel like I mean it is trending pretty rapidly I mean that that's that it's fascinating. I don't think it's been talked about enough I mean you have all these return to offices, but no one's saying that the number of 100 percent in office companies in 2023 is going down that is just absolutely fantastic crazy

Rob: 34:41

I love that term also that you gave that that leadership nostalgia. I think it's, um. It's such an important point. And I think a lot of people in some ways people look at it is a negative, you know, and I think there's a lot of judgment that goes against CEOs or execs and saying, Hey, look like they're living in this bygone era, you know, and that's kind of why they want full time in office. I think it's a little bit different, but the implications in some ways are the same. I think what's happening is it's In times of stress, when the market is complicated, you're not sure where the economy is going, the company has been challenged, whatever it might be. People fall back on the things that made them successful earlier in their career. That's what we lean on, right? It's like that's our comfort place, we go back to that. Most executives in the world today grew up in an environment that was full time in office. And they remember their companies being successful when it was full time in office. And they grew up successful out of that environment. And so it's very human. It's a desire to go back to the things that made it work for you. Because change is scary, especially when the future is uncertain. And I think there's not enough empathy around that. Now, we have to move past it, right? And with each year, people will get better at this and move past it. But I think that's where a lot of execs are coming from. They're trying to say, hey, look, this worked for us. And employees are saying, Yeah, but the world is different. And we have to embrace change and understand some of the opportunity that comes with that.

Rick: 36:08

Mmm.

Kaleem: 36:09

I'll try, Rob. You're right, that's something I've been talking a lot about. I need more empathy for some of these leaders. Like, Hey, Kaleem, if you were in their shoes, how would you feel? And you're absolutely correct. So thank you, Rob.

Rick: 36:20

it's so easy for us to point the finger

Kaleem: 36:23

Yeah.

Rick: 36:24

you know.

Rob: 36:25

By the way, I do it too. It's just, it's hard, right? You know, and it's like, look, as much as we may know. we haven't run 200, 000 person organizations. Like it's a different kind of experience around it. And those, it's going to have to be, there's going to have to be new skills in leadership practices and approaches that are going to have to do that. And as we talked about before, in terms of trends, like those are, that's the Titanic, like those ships don't turn in two seconds, right? They take quarters and years to actually evolve. And they're early in those journeys.

Rick: 36:55

Yep. Yeah, so Rob, do us a favor, would ya? Tell us about a comical or inspiring moment that you have had while working remotely.

Rob: 37:05

Uh, I will tell you about one that I think is, uh, is a pretty embarrassing one, actually. Uh,

Rick: 37:11

Oh, we like those.

Kaleem: 37:12

We need details, you know, give us the time, give us the year, give us how you were feeling, was the sweat dripping down your face, give it to us, Rob, give it to us!

Rob: 37:21

you got it. You got it. So my wife and I moved back to New York in 2021. And, my wife was pregnant at the time. My daughter was born in August of 2021. So this was to set the stage. This was. The day before she was born, right? So the day that my wife went into labor and, my wife and I were both working predominantly remote at the time. Uh, luckily we have enough space at home that I'm kind of in one part of the house and can kind of do my thing. She's in a different house. We have pretty good remote hygiene where we treat it. Like we're both at the office. We don't just like randomly pop in and interrupt. Right. And that's kind of how we do it. At the same time, my wife was like. 40 weeks pregnant, right? And so I'm like, Hey, you know, you can, and so it's all kinds of stuff. And so, uh, you know, it's middle of the afternoon. I'm in a meeting and, just sends me a text my wife and says, Hey, let me know when you finish up. Um, wanted to chat with you about something. It's like 30 minutes into a 60 minute meeting. I was like, sure. Happy to do it.

Kaleem: 38:21

no, no worries.

Rob: 38:22

Uh, meeting finishes up. I go out and she goes, I've been having contractions five minutes apart for over a minute for like the last, like,

Kaleem: 38:30

Interruptible.

Rob: 38:30

I'm like, Jess, I know we're like trying to like be good remote, you know, but like that is like, that is one of those things where like you could have been like, we should go. So we like immediately back up, go to the hospital. And I was like, Jess, I still can't believe that you did that. You know, it's like, uh. That's

Rick: 38:48

She's made of steel,

Kaleem: 38:49

Yeah, remote work etiquette gone too far.

Rick: 38:53

Yeah.

Rob: 38:54

Yeah, too far. Exactly.

Kaleem: 38:56

That's awesome.

Rob: 38:56

Way too far.

Kaleem: 38:57

So obviously everything worked out, right? Everything was great.

Rob: 39:00

Everything was good. Uh, baby was good. Um, but it was a pretty funny moment where I was like, Jesse, you can't be

Kaleem: 39:06

She didn't even knock on the door. She sent you a text. That's the best.

Rob: 39:09

That'd be a text. And it was Like, and it was a text like, Hey, you know, just like, let me know when you have a minute, I want to chat with you about something as if like, it was like the the weather or Like, what we're going to do for dinner tonight, you

Kaleem: 39:22

Like, she's your assistant too. Like, when you have a moment, can we chat about something serious?

Rick: 39:27

yes.

Rob: 39:28

know? So that's a pretty silly remote moment. Yeah.

Rick: 39:30

yeah, that, that's a great moment. Hold on to her with all you've got. That's

Kaleem: 39:34

Yes. Yes. Tell her we said that was way too far remote work etiquette, but we appreciate that. We appreciate it.

Rob: 39:43

I will pass along the regards.

Kaleem: 39:45

Yes. Yeah.

Rick: 39:46

So, Rob, where can our listeners and viewers find you?

Rob: 39:49

A couple of different places. So we publish all of our research, everything that we talked about data wise, et cetera, it's all on our site. So flex. scoopforwork. com. Every report we put out is free. So you get all the information there. It's pretty good stuff. Two, we have a Substack newsletter, that's got about 3, 500 subscribers. We send weekly content, on things that we're researching, latest insights, data, et cetera. So check that out. Flex index on Substack. As you mentioned earlier, I write quite a bit and share stuff on LinkedIn, so you can find me on LinkedIn. We also post under, Scoop and under FlexIndex, with different kind of like hybrid work or flexible work data, insights, things like that. And then lastly, if you're interested in our software, because you're hybrid or distributed and Trying to figure out how to better coordinate around when you're in the office or spend less time in crappy meetings. You can go to scoop for work. com. Anyone can get started for free and, and check that out.

Kaleem: 40:42

Awesome, man.

Rick: 40:43

Rob Sadow, thank you so much for joining us today.

Kaleem: 40:45

Thank you.

Rob: 40:47

guys. I appreciate it.

Kaleem: 40:48

Awesome, man. I'll talk to you. later, man.