The federal government's approach to hybrid work for public servants is under scrutiny, with rumours of a potential full-time return to the office circulating in Ottawa. Prime Minister Mark Carney has hinted that a clearer plan will be unveiled soon, but the evidence driving these potential policy changes remains opaque.
A Policy Made Without Productivity Data
Critically, the Treasury Board confirmed it conducted no studies on productivity before implementing the current mandate, which requires most federal employees to be in the office three days a week. While a task force on public service productivity was announced, its final report, released on December 12, notably excluded hybrid work from its scope.
Among its 19 recommendations, the task force urged the government to improve data collection to measure productivity effectively. However, the Treasury Board has stated it does not intend to act on this specific advice, a decision that has drawn criticism from policy observers.
Public Sector "Flying Blind" Compared to Private Sector
Management experts highlight a stark contrast in how the public and private sectors approach hybrid work analysis. Linda Duxbury, a professor at Carleton University, points out that large private corporations like Microsoft generate extensive internal research on remote and office work.
"The public sector is taking all kinds of actions, with no data," Duxbury said. "The private sector is collecting all kinds of data, all over the place."
Étienne Charbonneau, a professor at the National School of Public Administration, explains the inherent challenge: private firms have clear performance indicators, while government aims to "do as much as possible with the money they have."
What Existing Research Indicates
For tasks measurable in the private sector, such as coding or call volume, research often shows comparable productivity between home and office settings, though results are not unanimous. Charbonneau notes that quality studies exist comparing output in these environments.
A recent study published in the journal Nature examined a Chinese tech company and found that hybrid work arrangements did not affect the performance grades of software engineers or the number of lines of code they produced.
The core question persists: without dedicated, robust data on the Canadian public service's unique functions, how can evidence-based decisions about work location be made? As the government prepares to potentially sharpen its hybrid work policy, this research gap leaves public servants and taxpayers wondering about the foundation of the impending rules.
