the think tank Terra Nova proposes a minimum annual base of 24 days

In a report published Friday, October 7the think tank Terra Nova formulates a series of proposals around telework to, in particular, fight against the culture of presenteeism in companies and set up a “socially responsible hybrid work”.

The think tank marked on the left starts from the observation that remote work provoked “forced march” by the Covid-19 pandemic “is here to last”. Among eighty-six proposals, the report suggests, among other things, the establishment by a national inter-professional agreement of a minimum annual base for telework set “24 days (as in Germany)”if the tasks of the employees and the activities of the company allow it.

It also refers to the creation of a “teleworking title”for “encourage companies to facilitate their employees’ access to shared workspaces and thus give them the choice of the place of work (on site, in a third place or at home)”.

Training of managers and adaptation of social rituals

The report also suggests tackling the culture of presenteeism “still too deeply rooted in our country” or recommends to employers who are struggling to recruit or retain their employees to question the place given to working from home, “often underdeveloped”. The authors also note that “71% of business leaders have not planned any training for managers” to practices adapted to hybrid work, noting a risk of a managerial transition which risks “calm down”.

They also invite companies to review their “social rituals” (breaks, meetings, etc.) to adapt them to hybrid work. Among their many proposals, they further suggest attaching to teleworking agreements a right to disconnect or establishing the possibility for any employee to make known his unsatisfied wish to telework – within a monitoring committee in the companies of more than fifty employees, with trade unions elsewhere.