After a series of bumps and starts that included what, on the surface, seemed like a small but attention-grabbing employee rebellion, Orion Advisor Solutions has devised a plan to turn the office around that will turn most of 1300 employees. employees work at the company's eight locations three days a week.
Orion's executive leaders settled on the policy after seven months of deliberations. Internal planning was temporarily disrupted when an employee survey sparked a protest, as reported by Citywire AND RIABiz. Citing unnamed sources, both reported that employees were unhappy with what they perceived as a request to return to the office made without employee input or sufficient discretionary flexibility. An internal survey of employees laid out many different possible back-to-office scenarios, but it was met with anger by many.
According to Orion CEO Natalie Wolfsen, that initial survey was only meant to explore options and gather employee feedback.
“The impression was that we had issued a decree and that was simply not the case,” she said, speaking in a recent interview at the company's New York City office. “In the evolution of the plan, everyone's input was taken with the initial survey and even more came from the focus groups,” which were held in the wake of the revolt, Wolfsen said.
Of course, the controversy was a tempest in a teapot compared to the fallout at other companies struggling with remote work policies. In February 2023, Amazon announced a return to the office request that resulted in employee departures worldwide.
“It's all emotional, and you have to show that you have heart, and that was always the goal,” Wolfsen said. The entire management team felt the need to balance personal collaboration, training and networking with the desire many employees had to continue working from home. Complicating matters is that many employees came to the company from businesses acquired over the past few years, when most worked from home full-time.
Orion CEO Natalie Wolfsen
According to the final plan announced earlier this week and shared with WealthManagement.com, roughly one-third, or roughly 400 employees, who are already telecommuting will remain fully remote, with a request of at least one week past. in the office per year for the department. meetings and planning sessions.
More than 800 more Orion employees will gradually return to an office. Managers will return for two days each week starting in September, followed by all other non-remote workers in October.
Until January, non-remote workers will work in the office three days a week on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Beginning in April, a “choice week” policy begins.
Choice weeks allow employees to work wherever they want for one week at a time. Each employee has eight weeks of choice per year. They can take up to four consecutive election weeks at a time.
Choice weeks are intended to help people accommodate personal schedules, such as vacations and children's school breaks, or times when an employee chooses to work away from an office, say in a second home, or help out with care for elderly parents.
Before this eight-week policy, which begins early next year, employees will have two weeks of vacation to use during the last two weeks of December.
Orion employees can earn four additional weeks of options per year in 2026 if they collectively meet the company's key performance indicator targets for 2025.
“What we have in this plan is very different from the initial options that were in the survey,” she said.
After initial employee complaints, Orion executives went back to the drawing board. They formed seven internal working committees to help shape the strategy.
Each had an area of focus, from discussing flexibility to analyzing travel distances and other logistics. More than 100 team members participated in working committees or focus groups.
When asked how this seemingly complex system would be tracked, Wolfsen said Orion would rely on its HR system on the workday to monitor compliance and track the week's pick options.
“That's one of the reasons to get managers back in early, to train them and be able to make sure people are logging their time,” she said. “And then we want to be able to track whether employees are actually using those choice weeks.”