Managers say the future of work is hybrid

Nearly two years after the emergence of the COVID-19 outbreak in the U.S., money management firms of various sizes are preparing to return to a hybrid work schedule, whereby employees will be in the office a few days a week and working remotely on other days.

While the hybrid schedule varies somewhat by firm, the money managers that Pensions & Investments spoke to as part of its 10th annual Best Places to Work in Money Management program asserted that the health and welfare of employees and the need to maintain their corporate culture ranked foremost in their decisions.

Most money managers want workers to return to offices, at least for two or three days a week, due to the Three C’s: culture, collaboration and control, said Keith Robinson, Chicago-based managing partner at Focus Consulting Group Inc.

“Some firms worry that their culture might deteriorate if workers were all-remote for too long, but we have seen no evidence of this,” he said. While “collaboration” refers to the close relationships necessary between investment teams and other parts of the company, this is a big reason why a number are choosing a full-time return or hybrid environment, he said.

Take Capital Group Cos. Inc., for example.

Andrea Gill, Los Angeles-based co-chief human resources officer at Capital Group, said in an email that the company, which went fully remote in March 2020, will return to a hybrid work arrangement in the new year.

“We believe in the benefits (of) in-person time together for collaboration, creativity, and deep relationship-building,” she said.

Capital Group, ranked No. 2 among employers with 1,000 or more employees, has more than $2.6 trillion in assets under management as of June 30 and more than 8,000 employees globally. The firm is an active investor in both equities and fixed income.

Ms. Gill said that during the pandemic the firm “enhanced benefits” to help workers take care of themselves and their loved ones — including such programs as one-on-one counseling, extra paid time off for accommodating personal needs and virtual town hall forums on vaccinations.

Another manager reiterated the benefits of in-person interactions to supporting its corporate culture.

“I played football in college — I can’t imagine doing drills alone and then being expected to come together on game day and play our best,” said Steven Goulart, New York-based president of MetLife Investment Management. “Asset management is a team sport, and effective teams need to spend time together, face to face. One of the most important benefits of the office is career coaching and development. If I had been told at age 25 that I would never see my boss in person, I would have found that very discouraging,” he said.

“One way people learn and grow is by observing, and closer is better,” he added.

A newcomer in 2021 to the Best Places program, MetLife Investment Management ranked No. 5 among employers with between 500 to 999 employees, with about 700 employees and assets under management of more than $660 billion as of June 30.

Mr. Goulart said the firm is expecting most employees to come into the office three days per week starting in the new year. “Of course, different roles and functions have different requirements, impacting whether they spend more or less time in the office,” he added.

“We surveyed our people and had managers review and assess all of their roles before arriving at a model that we think preserves the best of both worlds — in-office collaboration combined with significantly greater flexibility.”

Michael Klein, New York-based managing director, co-president and chief risk officer of Aetos Alternatives Management LP, said the company has half of its roughly 30-member staff in New York and the other half in Menlo Park, Calif.

“When the pandemic hit, we became 100% remote and remained so until this past summer,” Mr. Klein said. At the California office, employees returned to full-time, in-person work three days a week starting in October, Mr. Klein noted. Beginning in early January 2022, the New York office will have a similar arrangement. He estimated that currently 20% of its New York employees regularly come into the office on a voluntary basis.

“While we have done a good job remotely sustaining the quality of our work and our culture, we do not think we can do so permanently without some amount of in-person collaboration,” Mr. Klein added. “Culture is not taught in a lecture hall; it is learned everyday through the observance of the actions of our culture carriers. This is especially important for junior team members and lateral new hires where mentoring and other practices enhance and further our culture in the long term.”

Mr. Klein also noted that the hybrid schedule was influenced by a survey of staff and managers.

“The arrangement we have rolled out is the result of this inclusive effort,” he added. “All team members will be able to work remotely two days per week, and if a team member needs further flexibility on a more permanent basis, we will evaluate their need on a case-by-case basis.”

Mr. Klein added his staff is “very positive” about the hybrid return to work model and that the New York office is eager to return to some kind of normalcy.

Ranked No. 5 among employers with between 20 to 49 employees, Aetos had roughly $9 billion in assets under management.

Some money managers had already been in a remote mode even before the pandemic.

Rachel Trock, Boca Raton, Fla.-based head of human resources at growth investment manager Polen Capital Management LLC, said Polen in 2015 became an early adopter of cloud computing and implemented a “results-only work environment,” or ROWE, under which employees are “measured by their results, rather than on the number of hours worked.” Polen ranked No. 1 among employers with between 100 to 499 employees.

As such, she said the company’s operations were not affected by the pandemic. As of June 30, the firm’s assets totaled $73.1 billion.

“We have embraced a ‘work from anywhere’ culture since 2015, which made for minimal organizational disruption in 2020,” she said. “Whoever wants to come into our offices to work is free to do so … but it is in no way required as long as the results are there.”

Currently, about 5% of Polen’s workers are fully remote, with most other employees coming to the office anywhere between one and five days per week, Ms. Trock said. Concerning 2022 — particularly in light of the new omicron variant — Ms. Trock noted the situation “has been changing so rapidly, it’s impossible to know what we will do next year. Whatever we do, we will keep the health and safety of our employees and their families top of mind.”

Meanwhile, Deane Mayerhofer, Chicago-based chief operating officer of Strategic Retirement Partners — which ranked No. 2 among employers with between 50 to 99 employees — said the company’s employees are spread far and wide, from as far west as San Diego to as far east as Williamsburg, Va., and many points in between.

“The pandemic did not change our company’s operations at all since we were already primarily a ‘virtual’ operation from our founding in 2015,” she said. “Unlike many other firms, we did not have to scramble to deal with the new reality.”

Ms. Mayerhofer said SRP has encouraged remote work arrangements for two principal reasons — to select the best candidates from the widest talent pool possible and to cater to the personal needs of employees.

Given that remote working and virtual communications were already deeply ingrained into SRP’s culture, the pandemic only reinforced already existing practices, she said. Ms. Mayerhofer estimates that about 75% of the company’s associates work remotely full time.

Jen Frost, Greenwich, Conn.-based principal and chief human resources officer at quantitative investment firm AQR Capital Management LLC, which ranked No. 1 among employers with between 500 to 999 employees, said the pandemic has led the firm to adopt a “more flexible model.”

AQR had $137 billion in AUM as of June 30.

“We have implemented a hybrid work model to preserve our firm’s strong culture and foster collaboration, while supporting the needs of our employees’ work-life balance,” Ms. Frost wrote in an email. “Beginning in January, the majority of our employees will be in the office three days a week and working remotely two days a week.”

Ms. Frost added that “successfully operating in a fully remote capacity over this past year and a half has changed the way we have worked and paved the way for us to adopt a more flexible model. Our hybrid work model recognizes the effectiveness of remote work coupled with the collaboration and connectivity that comes with being together, in-person, in an office environment.”