Welcome to this week’s issue of Talent Edge Weekly—the weekly newsletter for human resources practitioners, bringing together insights about work, the workplace, and the workforce from various sources.

If you find value in this issue or any of its resources, please share them with your network by using the social media icons at the top of the newsletter.

Have a great week, and I look forward to sharing more ideas in next week’s Edge!

Brian 

Brian Heger is a human resources practitioner with a Fortune 150 organization and has responsibilities for Strategic Talent and Workforce Planning. To connect with Brian on Linkedin, click here.

THIS WEEK'S CONTENT

• Capital One Will Become a Hybrid Work Company | Dallas Innovates | Shares key points from an internal memo that Capital One Founder and CEO Richard Fairbank shared with employees about the firm adopting a flexible hybrid model.

• Optimizing Return-to-Office Strategies With Organizational Network Analysis (ONA)| MIT Sloan Management Review | Provides an overview of how firms can use the data-driven approach of ONA to inform their return-to-office strategy, including determining which activities are best done virtually and in-person.

• Designing Performance Management (PM) to Work for Hybrid Work | Reworked | Shares four strategies to minimize the risks of unintentionally disadvantaging people---from a PM perspective-- through hybrid work arrangements.

• Webcast: Work Reimagined: The Future Of Collaboration and Hybrid Work Discussion | Forbes and Webex by Cisco | One-hour discussion with CHRO's from Cisco, Pepsico, and Farmer's Insurance on how the future of work is inclusive and hybrid and what next-generation employee experiences look like.

• Legal Implications of Remote Work Arrangements: Perspectives From the U.S., UK, and France | Hogan Lovells & JDSupra | Addresses remote work implications for employees and organizations in the U.S., U.K., and France to consider, such as tax impacts, the applicability of pay and labor laws, and changes in employee status.

• Unpacking Board Culture: How Behavioral Psychology Might Explain What’s Holding Boards Back | PwC | Highlights how to detect four critical biases that negatively impact board member interaction and performance; offers suggestions to address.

THIS WEEK'S EDGE

Capital One Will Become a Hybrid Work Company | Dallas Innovates 

Many leaders continue to guide workers on the future of remote work and hybrid work within their organizations. Last week, Capital One Founder and CEO Richard Fairbank announced in an internal memo that Capital One will adopt a “flexible hybrid model,” allowing most of its workforce to split their work time between virtual and office settings. Key points from the memo include: 1) Mondays and Fridays will be enterprise-wide virtual work days. 2) Capital One offices will be fully open Tuesdays through Thursdays. 3) Associates are “strongly encouraged” to spend meaningful time in the office collaborating with colleagues. 4) Teams will coordinate time in the office to harness the benefits of co-location. 5) Associates will not be required to be in the office a certain number of days; associates and leaders will “balance in-person collaboration, and team needs with individual choice and flexibility.” 6) Coming into the office will be strongly encouraged but not mandatory. 7) Capital One will continue to support ‘fully remote’ exceptions with senior executive approval. The memo provides ideas for firms that are developing their guidance on this topic. 

Optimizing Return-to-Office Strategies With Organizational Network Analysis | MIT Sloan Management Review 

This article argues for a data-driven approach when informing a return-to-office strategy. In particular, Organizational network analysis (ONA) — a method that maps employees’ working relationships — offers an approach for answering three questions: 1) Who should be brought back together in a weekly cadence of in-person and virtual interactions? 2) What work should be prioritized in the now scarcer in-person time? 3) How do leaders manage the transition to a hybrid model with the least resistance? The article has charts to illustrate the answers to these questions using ONA. For example, the first chart shows how ONA data from a biotech company showed demand for in-person interactions was much higher in four business units. The second chart illustrates how employees want more in-person interactions with peers for rich qualitative exchanges (e.g., problem-solving, brainstorming) and prefer virtual modalities for lean transactional interactions (e.g., information sharing, decision-making). This data-driven approach can “help employees see the value of in-person collaboration and positively shape their attitudes about returning to the office in a hybrid work environment.”

Designing Performance Management to Work for Hybrid Work | Reworked 

This article, by Stacia Sherman Garr of RedThread Research, shares four strategies to adjust performance management (PM) practices for a hybrid work world. In particular, it helps minimize the risks of unintentionally disadvantaging people---from a PM perspective-- through hybrid work arrangements. Said differently, it provides the opportunity to enable people to do their best work and have a fair shot at being recognized for it. The four tactics include 1) Goal or objective clarity is vital. 2.) Check-ins and alignment conversations need to happen weekly. 3) Broaden the pool of feedback sources. 4) Make time to reduce bias in assessments. A few tactics across these four areas include 'requiring managers to discuss direct reports' performance with leaders and peers' and 'analyzing performance scores by gender, and discussing potential anomalies.' These and other tactics can reduce bias in a hybrid work world in which biases are more likely to manifest. If you missed it, you could also check out this one-hour webinar by Angela Lane and Marc Effron on tactics for reducing PM bias. Similarly, this additional article by Deloitte provides tactics for mitigating PM bias. 

Webcast: Work Reimagined: The Future Of Collaboration and Hybrid Work Discussion | Forbes and Webex by Cisco 

This first episode of Work Reimagined, presented by Forbes and Webex by Cisco, covers how the future of work is inclusive and hybrid and what next-generation employee experiences look like. The one-hour discussion is hosted by Peter High, Forbes Contributor & President, Metis Strategy, and captures opinions from HR and business leaders, including Francine Katsoudas, Executive VP and Chief People, Policy & Purpose Officer, Cisco; Jeetu Patel, SVP and General Manager, Security & Collaboration, Cisco; Deborah Aldredge, Chief Administrative Officers, Farmers Insurance; Sergio Ezama, Chief Talent Officer and CHRO Global Functions & Groups, Pepsico. A few of the key takeaways include 1) how equal opportunity for engagement, regardless of who the person is or where they are located, is critical. 2) Organizations need to improve spontaneous-communication capabilities across hybrid-work environments, 3) Time spent in the office will become more critical, serving 4 key roles – create, collaborate, celebrate, and connect. The discussion is full of additional insights and is worth the time investment. 

Legal Implications of Remote Work Arrangements: Perspectives From the U.S., UK, and France | Hogan Lovells |JDSupra 

Many employers continue to adjust work practices and policies to enable remote and hybrid work. And while many workers and organizations are embracing these changes, these decisions have various implications. As noted in a Gallup Workplace article I shared, "although physically and theoretically people can work anywhere, they can't be employed everywhere." Or said differently in this new article, employers need to be aware of several legal issues and considerations that may apply when employees work from home and that "home" is located in another state or country. This article covers remote work implications for employees and organizations in the U.S., U.K., and France to consider, such as tax implications, the applicability of pay and labor laws, and changes in employee status. For example, in the U.S., employers withhold and pay taxes in the state where the employee works, even if the employer does not have an office in that state. Thus, if an employee works from home and moves to a different state, the employer must withhold and pay taxes in the employee's new state. However, in the U.K., an employee's tax position will generally not change if they are working from home and move within the U.K., unless they move to or from Scotland. In France, remote working will, in principle, have no impact on the employee's tax position. Several other ideas are discussed. 

Unpacking Board Culture: How Behavioral Psychology Might Explain What’s Holding Boards Back | PwC 

A primary role of a board of directors is to oversee aspects of a firm's talent management and culture. However, effective boards also evaluate themselves against these criteria regarding their group dynamics and how they determine which topics get discussed, which get ignored, who gets listened to, who is dismissed, and why. This 15-page report highlights four critical bias areas that impact board member interaction and detract from board performance: 1) Authority bias, 2) Groupthink, 3) Status quo bias, and 4) Confirmation bias. For each of the four areas, suggestions are offered for how boards can spot these issues, and techniques are shared to combat the negative effects. For example, one sign of authority bias is when the board regularly defers to the views of the authority figure—either as a subject matter expert or because of their board leadership role. One tactic to combat this issue is to have board leadership or an expert purposely withhold opinions until the end of the discussion. While this report is written through the lens of the board of directors, the insights are helpful for spotting and addressing similar biases that negatively impact team dynamics in general.

RESULTS FROM LAST WEEK'S POLL

THIS WEEK'S POLL

If there is a poll question you would like to see in an upcoming newsletter, you can submit your question HERE.

MOST SHARED RESOURCE FROM LAST WEEK

• 9 Articles on the Hybrid Workplace | Gartner’s HR Leaders Monthly - July | Provides a collection of articles that explores the hybrid workforce model from multiple perspectives, including critical questions HR leaders need to answer as they design their hybrid workforce strategies.

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