The future of work in creativity and innovation: perspectives on on-siteversus remote work policies and practices
File(s)
Published version (ahead of print)
Author(s)
Roche, Maria
Choudhury, Prithwiraj
Larson, Barbara
ter Wal, Anne
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Do organisations need mandatory return-to-office policies to foster creativity and innovation? This article evaluates that question through a balance synthesis of arguments presented in a live debate at the 2025 DRUID conference. The argument in favour of office mandates highlights that sustained and predictable patterns of co-presence enable the knowledge spillovers, tacit knowledge exchange, serendipitous encounters, intimate co-creation, and cultural cohesion that are critical to creativity and innovation. The case against such mandates stresses their potential costs, including reduced autonomy, psychological reactance, weaker motivation, homophily, and the risk of mistaking presence for effective collaboration, especially given the growth of distributed innovation and given that remote work allows firms to tap into distant talent. Our collective assessment is that co-presence clearly matters for creative and innovative work. The evidence presented during the debate does not clearly support the stronger claim that the threshold must be a majority of working time, or that the policy instrument must be a mandate. We conclude that the key challenge is not simply where people work, but how organisations facilitate interaction and collaboration across modes of work.
Date Issued
2026-09-22
Date Acceptance
2026-07-23
Citation
Industry and Innovation, 2026
ISSN
1366-2716
Publisher
Taylor and Francis Group
Journal / Book Title
Industry and Innovation
Copyright Statement
© 2026 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.
Publication Status
Published online
Date Publish Online
2026-09-22