HBR's "Hybrid Still Isn't Working" Misses the Mark. Here's How Hybrid Succeeds.

Now: HBR's prescription for "hybrid" challenges would actually make them worse. Next: Organizations will succeed with flexible work by building competitive advantage through strategic transformation.

I know I need to comment on an article when multiple people send it to me. This time it's "Hybrid Still Isn't Working" from Harvard Business Review's most recent issue.

Why comment? Because CEOs are likely forwarding this same article to others with a note: "Thoughts?"

Based on my 25+ years of experience executing flexible work strategies, here's why—respectfully—what the authors recommend won't work:

🎯 Pro tip #1: You can't tactically patch a flexible work model that was executed under crisis circumstances, which most were during the pandemic.

Even if you fix meetings (which everyone should), the foundational parameters of the model—where, when, and how work happens best—were never intentionally defined to meet the unique realities of a business AND its workforce. That's why it's not working.

Defining the model needs to be done by the business line, not by HR, which is the main audience for this article.

🎯 Pro tip #2: "Hybrid" and "remote" are too easily confused and conflated, as they are in the article. Stop leading with "where."

When you lead with the "where" and not performance, you aren't answering the right question: How does our organization perform at a high level working flexibly across places, spaces, and time?

To be sure, the article identifies real problems: collaboration gaps, cultural fragmentation, and performance issues (although it's not clear the research cited is based on well-executed models—most likely it is not).

Their proposed fix? More one-size-fits-all rules, stricter enforcement, and a retreat to 2019 ways of working.

What? Well, if that's the case, it would be flexible—as confirmed by another data-rich article that crossed my screen recently citing 2019 IWG data showing "75% of workers considered flexible working the new normal."

Flexibility is not new, just accelerated during the pandemic. So going back to 2019 isn't the answer.

The companies that make hybrid "work" aren't managing "hybrid policies"—they're defining the parameters of a go-forward operating model.

They start with the work and business outcomes, not office attendance. They develop manager capabilities, not enforcement protocols. They measure performance impact, not badge swipes.

The IMF Story: What the Strategic Alignment of High-Performance Flexibility Looks Like

In fact, that's what one of our clients, the IMF, did—and the difference is so obvious that Nick Bloom mentioned it in a comparison to the less successful "hybrid" model of the World Bank at minute 19:10 in his recent speech at Running Remote 2025 (embedded in this recent Allwork article).

Two similar organizations with two different flexible work models. As Bloom explains, one model is working well—the IMF's "Tuesday and Thursday in the office." One model is not working as well—the World Bank's "four days in the office."

From our direct experience with the IMF, the difference isn't that one picked days and enforced it while the other didn't. That is not what the IMF did, and it's likely the reason their model is succeeding.

Some background on the IMF's model and approach that provides context to the comparison:

In 2021, the IMF started to lay the foundation for the organization-wide alignment that Bloom describes in his talk. The IMF's impressive Office of Innovation and Change kicked off a deliberate multi-phased process designed to ultimately get all levels on the same page about how the bank would work across places, spaces, and time on the other side of the pandemic.

Part of that kick-off in 2021 was a Leadership Retreat with the entire IMF senior leadership team that our firm helped to develop and facilitate. The goal was to:

✅ Introduce leaders to the possibilities and potential benefits of reimagining how IMF work gets done.

✅ Initiate discussions grounded in the IMF's behavioral cornerstones of collaboration, innovation, agility, and empathy, and FSG's High Performance Flexible Operating Model process.

✅ Identify and share leadership ways of being and actions that enable success.

✅ Acknowledge the leadership commitment required to implement a hybrid work model.

Getting leaders aligned at the start behind a shared vision of where, when, and how work will be done—and how the organization will get there—is key to any work transformation's success. It's an investment of time and effort the IMF made upfront that set the tone for the next phases of transformation throughout the rest of the organization.

It's rewarding to hear four years later that Bloom describes how all levels seem to understand and support the flexible way work is being done today. No "enforcement" needed.

🎯 Pro tip #3: Don't retreat and sacrifice the future because transformation is hard.

Organizations that conclude "bringing everyone back to the office full-time is easier" will scratch their heads in five years wondering why their top talent left for competitors with dynamic, flexible work models and they can't hire the best and brightest in an increasingly constrained labor market.

I continue to wonder what it’s going to take for organizations to stop counting days and commit to building a flexible work model that will win in 2030. There's a real risk this misguided HBR article will make things worse unless those who receive it from their CEO with a note "Thoughts?" respond, "I think it misses the mark. Here's why and what we need to do instead."

And, as always, we are here to help "hybrid" succeed in your organization.