by Professor G V Muralidhara

Sharing his views about working from home that became necessary as organizations adjusted to coping with the pandemic, Rishad Premji, Chairman of WIPRO in an interview given in September 2020 said "We want people to come back to build culture, right? I'm spending a lot of time personally, over the last six months on culture. And the reality is that culture grows by osmosis. Culture grows by people engaging at the coffee machine, or the water cooler, gossiping about the organization, exchanging notes. That's a very core part of how things build and grow. And it's equally crucial for innovation. Oftentimes, innovation happens in the downtime when you don't expect something to come about, and something comes about. So, for those two reasons, I think it's important that people come back."

There has been a lot of talk during the last few months about the pros and cons of working from home and whether it is conducive for people and organizations to perform at their optimum level. Forced by the pandemic, many organizations had to resort to making their employees work from home. Many CEOs aver that WFH is here to stay for the foreseeable future in their organizations. Some IT companies have reduced their expenditure on office space by downsizing their offices.

Much before the pandemic and the recent developments, in 2013, Forbes reported varied reactions to the then Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer's announcement ending the policy that permitted flexible work locations of employees. She had said "For Yahoo to become the absolute best place to work, communication and collaboration will be important, so we need to be working side-by-side. That is why we must be all present in our offices. Some of the best decisions and insights come from hallway and cafeteria discussions, meeting new people, and impromptu encounters. We sacrifice speed and quality when we work from home. We need to be one Yahoo!, and that starts with physically being together."

While we hold different views on this topic, what's the impact on the health and performance of individuals and organizations?

Lin and Kwantes from the Department of Psychology at the University of Windsor who studied the potential benefits of 'Water Cooler' conversations predicted these outcomes strongly

• New employees who engage in high levels of private interactions are more likely to endear themselves to their colleagues compared to the cohort who engaged in low levels of private interactions.
• New employees who engage in high levels of private interactions are more likely to be judged as having higher job competence compared to the cohort who engaged in low levels of private interactions.
• They were more likely to be recommended by colleagues for future tasks or projects compared to the cohort who engaged in relatively low levels of private interaction.
• They were also more likely to receive support from colleagues compared to the cohort who engaged in low levels of private interactions.

McAlpine of Michigan State University investigated whether informal 'Water Cooler' communication was a significant predictor of creativity and innovation. She found that teams with greater location flexibility reported engaging in less frequent face-to-face spontaneous official communication and also less regular face-to-face chatter. She also found that the type of contact most affected by team location flexibility had the most significant impact on brainstorming and, consequently, on group innovation.

Paul Levy of the University of Brighton writing in BBC Worklife points to research that establishes the role of informal conversation in building community among colleagues which in turn fosters a commitment to a company. He says that in the health sector, corridor conversations can be an antidote to crises and complexity.

While the jury is out on the long term effects of the WFH policy that many companies have adopted, developers are trying to fill the void through apps that help remotely connected organizations create virtual water coolers anywhere and thus restore connections among their employees.

<aside> 🗣️ Check out these smartphone apps 'Donut' and ' WaterCooler'

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