WHAT YOUR RETURN TO OFFICE DATA ISN'T TELLING YOU
RETURN TO OFFICE, UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES
A real-world example of how well-intentioned decisions can create performance and retention risks when system conditions are not fully understood.
OVERVIEW
This example shows how everyday organisational decisions across policy, communication, and leadership can create unintended performance and retention outcomes.
THE SITUATION
A return-to-office approach was introduced to improve collaboration, visibility, and culture. Initial communication from senior leadership said there were no immediate changes and emphasised continued flexibility. The following day, office attendance expectations were reinforced at department level, and in a subsequent team meeting a once-weekly attendance arrangement was set out.
For one employee, this meant a five-hour round trip commute to attend a hybrid meeting, with little additional in-person collaboration taking place afterwards.
Fatigue had previously been raised and acknowledged, and some short-term flexibility had been offered, but the underlying demands of the role and travel remained unchanged. When weekly attendance began, it added new demands on top of an already strained situation.
Following the return-to-office discussion, the employee began looking for another job. They later resigned. Their tenure was eleven years, and they were the only person in the team who had worked across every active project.
IS THIS HAPPENING IN YOUR ORGANISATION?
If your organisation has recently introduced or tightened a return-to-office policy, some of these dynamics may already be in motion — even if they are not yet visible in your data.
In cases like this, early signals may be present well before headline data reflects them.
WHAT WAS HAPPENING IN PRACTICE
This was not simply a case of individual disengagement or lack of resilience. Multiple conditions were interacting at the same time:
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A policy intended to create consistency was applied across very different individual circumstances and role contexts
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Coordination demands increased without corresponding adjustment to workload or expectations
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Fatigue had been raised and acknowledged, but it did not lead to a lasting change in the underlying demands of the role
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When the employee asked what the business impact would be of reduced in-person attendance, the question was not directly addressed
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Greater flexibility appears to have been available later, but not at the point when it may have prevented resignation
WHAT THE ANALYSIS SURFACED
Applying a systemic Human Factors lens suggests that no single decision caused the outcome. Instead, several compounding conditions were interacting:
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Policy–work mismatch
A mandate designed at organisational level was experienced very differently depending on role and individual circumstances
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Load accumulation
An informal occupational health view indicated that the arrangement appeared unreasonable, but this did not form part of a formal decision pathway
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Feedback signal loss
Fatigue concerns were raised and acknowledged, but there is no indication that they altered the broader arrangement before attendance expectations increased
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Consistency pressure
After resignation, it was indicated that concerns about setting wider precedent may have influenced what was or was not offered earlier
WHAT THIS MEANT FOR THE BUSINESS
The impact extended beyond the resignation itself:
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Loss of the only employee with active involvement across every project the team was running
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Significant replacement and transition costs, including loss of continuity and knowledge transfer time
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Increased pressure on remaining team members to absorb the gap
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The underlying conditions remained in place, creating the possibility that similar dynamics could affect others
Notably, after the resignation was handed in, remote working with covered travel for in-person meetings was presented as workable. This suggests that more flexibility was available than had previously been made accessible.
WHAT THIS ENABLES
In this case, the conditions producing the outcome were identifiable before the resignation but only through a lens that examines how decisions interact across the system, not just how each decision appears in isolation.
A systemic approach allows organisations to move beyond surface-level fixes, identifying the underlying conditions shaping performance and retention, and where targeted intervention may have the greatest impact.
The full case analysis including the causal map and intervention points is explored in detail in our training programmes.