77.9% accepted their office rules, yet 69.1% still wanted telework — location flexibility is becoming part of job value

Office return is happening, but 69.1% still want telework

Neo Marketing surveyed 1,000 people aged 20 or older in Japan who had telework experience. Compared with the early pandemic period, 29.7% said their employer had restricted or reduced telework and moved toward more office attendance.

Yet 69.1% said they wanted to continue telework in the future. More office attendance and less desire for remote work are not the same thing.

77.9% also accepted their current office rules

25.3% said they strongly accepted their employer's current attendance rules and 52.6% somewhat accepted them, for a combined 77.9%.

That suggests many workers are not rejecting the office itself. They may instead be resisting a return to a system in which every task must always be done from the office.

Office Return ≠ Remote Rejection

Current arrangements remain diverse: 22.6% were fully remote, 16.7% teleworked three to four days a week, 22.4% one to two days, 12.2% several times a month, and 26.1% no longer teleworked.

Banseog frames the pattern as Office Return ≠ Remote Rejection. Office and remote work are increasingly combined rather than treated as mutually exclusive systems.

61.9% see telework as a condition when choosing their next job

21.9% said telework would be an essential condition when choosing an employer, while 40.0% said they would prefer a company where telework was possible.

Together that is 61.9%. Work location is increasingly being evaluated alongside salary, holidays and benefits.

The biggest benefit was commuting time, not simply being at home

The most cited benefit was reduced commuting time and stress at 54.5%. Working at one's own pace and concentrating more easily followed at 43.8%, while reduced preparation time for commuting was 42.2%.

The value of remote work may therefore be less about the home itself and more about the time and control returned to the worker.

Location flexibility can become part of total compensation

Compare a slightly higher-paying job requiring five office days with a similar-paying job that allows two or three telework days.

The difference includes commute time, fatigue, housing choices, childcare and personal time. Banseog therefore treats Money + Time + Location Flexibility as a more complete way to think about real job value.

The 40.0% productivity improvement figure is self-reported

40.0% said their productivity had improved with telework, 49.3% saw little difference, and 10.7% said it had declined.

These are self-assessments, not objective output or performance measures. The survey does not prove that telework causes higher productivity.

The disadvantages have shifted toward lifestyle management

The leading disadvantages were insufficient exercise at 34.9%, difficulty switching between work and private life at 32.5%, higher household utility costs at 30.5%, and communication difficulty at 25.7%.

The fact that exercise and boundary management ranked above communication suggests the challenge is no longer only remote-work technology; it is also long-term life design.

52.7% of the three-to-five-day telework group reported higher happiness

Across the full sample, 41.7% said their current happiness was higher than in the early pandemic period. Among those teleworking three to five days a week, the figure was 52.7%.

This is an association, not proof that telework caused the higher happiness response. Other job, income, household and workplace factors may be involved.

Hybrid work is a work-design problem, not only a days-per-week policy

A useful hybrid model may depend less on the number of remote days than on matching work to the environment where it is done best.

Offices may be better for collaboration, mentoring and relationship building, while remote settings may suit analysis, writing and deep focus. The strategic question becomes Right Work × Right Place.

The next stage of flexibility may be predictable choice

Unlimited freedom is not necessarily useful if attendance rules can change suddenly or depend on an individual manager.

Predictable Flexibility means a company sets clear principles and employees can design their work and life within those boundaries. That predictability itself may become part of employer value.

BANSEOG VIEW | Work location is becoming part of job value

77.9% accepted current office rules, 69.1% still wanted telework, and 61.9% considered telework availability when choosing a future employer.

Those numbers can coexist if workers are not demanding the right never to visit an office, but the right not to do every task there by default.

Telework is moving from an emergency pandemic arrangement toward one of the factors people calculate when deciding what a job is worth.