The pandemic fundamentally altered workforce dynamics, prompting a re-evaluation of work-life balance and employee expectations in offices around the world. Scholars in the US named the phenomena “the great resignation” since it resulted in unprecedented voluntary resignations within the US. In Europe it hasn’t resulted in abnormal resignations, but the same phenomena have resulted in ongoing discussions about flexible working arrangements of how the future of the in-office workplace will be managed. Simultaneously there has been an increase in stress levels among management, both during the pandemic and the preceding time after the pandemic. This paper therefore sets out to examine the impact of remote and its effects on managerial stress levels. By pursuing this purpose, this paper contributes to managerial research and helps companies in their development of strategies on how to support their managers in “the new normal” that the offices all over the world are experiencing.
This study uses a qualitative method to gather data, more specifically, semi-structured interviews with a series of open-ended questions. This adaptability facilitates the gathering of more comprehensive data and the emergence of unforeseen insights from 10 managers within3 different companies. The findings support that 4 out of 6 drivers of stress have a negative impact compared to pre-pandemic times. The stress drivers are thereafter divided to stress drivers due to remote work and stress drivers due to other reasons. The drivers affected by remote work practices include a higher workload, reduced perception of control, reduced connection to the community. It is therefore concluded that the remote working practices fueled by employee expectations towards remote work has a negative impact on managerial levels of stress.