Hybrid work in the Bay Area here to stay, survey indicates

(KRON) — Hybrid work could be here to stay in the Bay Area — at least for the time being. Those are the findings of a recent survey from the Bay Area Council. More than five years from the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, a majority of Bay Area workers remain on some kind of hybrid schedule.

As of February, 27% of employers surveyed require workers to come into the office three days a week, 17% to come in two days a week, and 7% to come in just one day a week. A quarter of employers surveyed, 25%, require workers to come in five or more days a week.

Meanwhile, 11% of workers surveyed remained on a full work-from-home schedule, with zero days in the office.

The survey has been conducted annually since April 2021 and is sent out to a group of over 100 employers who signed up to participate. Employers from all nine Bay Area counties and across different sectors took part.

A majority of employers surveyed — 84% — said they had already fully implemented their long-term policy for in-person and remote work. Another 5% said they would be implementing it in the next five to six months, while 3% said they would implement theirs within at least a year.

The number of employers who require some or all employees to visit or work in the workplace rose slightly to 68% compared to 62% in May 2024. More than half of employers in the survey — 61% — said they had not changed their attendance policies in the past six months.

An even greater number — 78% — said they had no plans to change their attendance policy in the next six months. The major reason most employers felt their employees don’t come in to the office more often was the amount of time it takes to commute, according to 73% of survey respondents, followed by preference for working at home at 71%.

Some 236 companies took part in the February survey, up from 138 companies in the prior most recent survey in May 2024.