What does adland make of WPP’s four office days per week mandate?

WPP announced a new policy last week requiring staff to work in the office at least four days a week, in an email chief executive Mark Read sent to staff.

The rules, which require employees to work from the office on at least two Fridays per month with flexibility to choose which other days they work remotely, have met with mixed of reactions in adland.

While some industry figures say that staff working together in person for certain projects and during some periods of the year is best, others admire the move, while others still view it as a “U-turn” on staff rights.

Marcus Brown, chief executive and founder of The Great Pitch Company, said he believes it is “clear that pitches can be put together without everyone needing to be in the office the whole time, [but] there's no doubt that having everyone working together at key points in the process is imperative”.

Hamish Day, client director at ad agency Dude London, said his shop has found being in the office four days a week “essential” to its culture, growth and day-to-day working.

Day added that this allows the agency to “collaborate in the best way possible – to have those impromptu moments of inspiration, and enjoy the company of colleagues”. He acknowledged this means Dude London “is not for everyone”.

Adele Lewis Bridgeman, founder of Responsible Resourcing Agency, meanwhile, highlighted that agency leaders should "encourage the right balance of policies and ways of working, to drive more face to face time and build culture”.

Marketing procurement consultant Tina Fegent said she believes that what’s most important for agencies when it comes to working patterns is "team dynamics and the culture of the agency and that comes from being and working together”.

She added that adland is an industry in which “people buy people and the strong teams are so good at demonstrating that. That investment in building the culture and supporting the staff does come across when you are buying agencies. It also helps people’s careers by working with their peers and having external stimuli outside of their working home environment.”

The global change to working patterns at WPP will take effect in April and apply across its operations in dozens of markets. 

While Brown was in favour of staff working in person for particular projects and during particular periods, Richard Robinson, executive director of Ingenuity+, said that the immediate response he had heard from brands, both among those that work with WPP and those that do not, had been “overwhelmingly positive”.

Robinson referred to “an admiration [that] WPP has done it, and a perception this will enable teams to better prioritise client needs. WPP is addressing both internal data and external expectations to clarify how they’ll deliver their best work moving forward”.

Read had outlined in the email confirming the mandate that data from across WPP agencies depicted “higher levels of office attendance are associated with stronger employee engagement, improved client survey scores and better financial performance. More of our clients are moving in this direction and expecting it of the teams who work with them.”

However, Thom Binding, founder of The Creative Communications Workers Union, said his organisation was of the belief that WPP’s announcement was a “U-turn on workers’ rights and catastrophic for diversity, equity and inclusion”.

He cited findings from a review of about 2000 academic papers on the advantages and disadvantages of working from home, conducted by King’s College London and the UK Health Security Agency, that “there is a need for a deeper understanding of the WFH context on a case-by-case basis” and managers “need to understand they cannot simply give the same advice and guidance to all staff using a one-size-fits-all approach”.

Binding also argued that blanket mandates on WFH policies “do not work” and are “in direct opposition to agency promises on DEI. WPP’s U-turn on flexible working means that as a company, WPP does not care about DEI as a matter of policy.”

It should be noted, however, that Read did state in the memo to WPP employees that there would be a “clear process to request additional flexibility – including for those with caring responsibilities, health issues and other considerations. Some roles that have always been fully or largely remote will continue as they are."

Nonetheless, Binding said requiring employees to request flexible working arrangements was “disempowering, and erodes opportunities to thrive in this industry. For employees and businesses to thrive, flexible working must be seen as an essential right, not a benefit. We will not sit back and expect agency bosses to maintain policies that work for us. We must exert pressure on agency leadership. If we don't, then many of us will lose flexible working entirely.”

Read also said that the move “doesn’t mean” the agency group is returning to the “old ways of doing things”, and highlighted that the coronavirus pandemic helped the industry learn the “value of greater flexibility in our working lives and of being trusted to balance work and personal commitments".

Lewis Bridgeman told Campaign there were “concerns” following WPP’s announcement that hybrid working, along with other variations on this model, was “slowly being rolled back to pre-pandemic times" from the "ongoing data" she has seen and conversations she has had with industry peers. She adds: "This nervousness and sense of unease is especially heightened when you consider talent who will be disproportionately affected such as parents, carers, women, ethnic minority and disabled talent and those from low socio-economic backgrounds."

She referred to the Deloitte 2024 Gen Z and Millennial Survey which showed a quarter of gen Z and almost a third (31%) of millennials chose their current employer due to a good work/life balance.

Read has insisted WPP needs to retain a “spirit of flexibility and trust”, and promised it would approach the transition “with pragmatism and an understanding of people’s different circumstances”.

Yet just a couple of days after the announcement was made, a petition was published on Change.org to demand WPP revoke the mandate. To date, it has been signed by more thant 8000 people, demonstrating that the policy has clearly not been welcomed by all.

WPP declined to comment beyond the contents of Read's email to WPP staff.