Bosses think workers do less from home, says Microsoft

A major new survey from Microsoft shows that bosses and workers fundamentally disagree about productivity when working from home.

Bosses worry about whether working from home is as productive as being in the office.

While 87% of workers felt they worked as, or more, efficiently from home, 80% of managers disagreed.

The survey questioned more than 20,000 staff across 11 countries.

Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella told the BBC this tension needed to be resolved as workplaces were unlikely to ever return to pre-pandemic work habits.

“We have to get past what we describe as ‘productivity paranoia’, because all of the data we have that shows that 80% plus of the individual people feel they’re very productive – except their management thinks that they’re not productive.