Dr. Gleb Tsipursky offers insight on the Q2 2025 Flex Report, explaining the rise in structured hybrid office spaces.
The Q2 2025 Flex Report lands with the force of a blueprint, not just for HR policies, but for how organizations must rethink the very spaces their employees inhabit. Despite headline-grabbing moves by titans like Amazon and JPMorgan Chase toward full-time in-office mandates, the broader landscape remains decidedly hybrid. The numbers are clear: only 33% of U.S. firms require full-time office attendance. That figure is nearly unchanged from last year, challenging the perception of a sweeping return to traditional office norms.
Structured Hybrid work now defines the new mainstream.
This shift is not just an evolution in policy but a call to action for architects, facilities managers, and workplace strategists to reimagine office environments for a workforce that flows, rather than anchors, to space.
Three Days Is the New Normal—and Design Must Catch Up
According to the report, 43% of U.S. firms now operate under Structured Hybrid policies, a steep rise from just 20% in Q1 2023. The dominant configuration? Three days per week in the office. Among these firms, 66% require exactly three days on-site, pushing the national average to 2.82 days. These aren’t arbitrary numbers—they reflect a growing consensus around the ideal cadence for collaboration without sacrificing flexibility.
For office designers, this raises critical implications. If most employees are in-office just three days per week, traditional desk-per-head layouts are not only inefficient—they are irrelevant. Instead, the focus must shift toward dynamic environments that support purposeful presence. That means fewer fixed desks and more modular spaces, enhanced acoustic zoning, and robust reservation systems to accommodate variable occupancy.
It also means shedding legacy assumptions. The five-day model underpinned decades of design thinking—from HVAC loads to bathroom ratios to café service hours. But when a third of employees may be remote at any time, adaptability becomes the prime directive.
Fortune 500 Firms Signal a Shift, But Reality Is Mixed
Within the Fortune 500, the percentage of firms requiring full-time office presence jumped from 13% to 24% in the last two quarters. Simultaneously, Fully Flexible arrangements—where employees choose when to work on-site—fell from 13% to just 7%. However, 69% of these corporate giants still embrace a hybrid model, primarily driven by Minimum Days requirements rather than fixed schedules.
This blend of increased expectations and retained flexibility introduces design tension. Offices must be compelling enough to warrant the commute, while still functioning efficiently at partial occupancy. The three-day norm, particularly Tuesday through Thursday, creates usage peaks that exacerbate bottlenecks in parking, elevators, and meeting rooms.
Designers must plan for these fluctuations, incorporating both overflow capabilities and quiet zones for the minority working on Mondays or Fridays. Workspace solutions must evolve beyond the binary of “home” and “office” to support a continuum of needs, from heads-down focus to spontaneous huddles.
Policy and Behavior: A Growing Discrepancy
Despite rising mandates, actual office attendance has barely budged. Data from Stanford’s Nick Bloom shows only a 1–2% increase in average presence, even as required days rose by 10%. This “compliance gap” reflects a disconnect between policy and practicality—and underscores a growing need for space that earns occupancy through experience, not enforcement.
Designing for experience means more than espresso machines and breakout lounges. It involves leveraging natural light, biophilic elements, and ergonomic layouts to create environments that enhance well-being and productivity. It also means embedding tech-forward solutions like smart sensors and app-based navigation to make every in-office day seamless and intuitive.
Size Matters: Flexibility Splits Along Organizational Lines
One of the report’s most striking revelations is the divide between small and large firms. Seventy percent of enterprises with over 25,000 employees favor Structured Hybrid, while the same percentage of firms under 500 employees remain Fully Flexible. This bifurcation has major implications for space design.
Smaller firms may maintain distributed, remote-first models that require satellite coworking spaces or occasional hoteling stations. In contrast, large enterprises need to retrofit campuses and towers to support partial utilization without wasting real estate. This might include converting rows of cubicles into reservable team pods or transforming underused lobbies into touchdown zones.
Even within tech—the standard-bearer of workplace innovation—size predicts rigidity. Large tech firms increasingly mirror Fortune 500 office mandates, while their smaller peers continue embracing employee choice. For designers, this means tailoring solutions not just to industry, but to scale.
A Strategic Imperative for Design Leaders
The Flex Report doesn’t merely chronicle a shift in work norms—it issues a challenge to the design community. As policies change faster than behavior, the spaces we build must bridge the gap, creating environments that both reflect organizational goals and respect individual rhythms.
For office design, this moment is pivotal. It’s not about eliminating the office, nor restoring it to its former glory. It’s about reengineering it to meet today’s reality: a landscape defined by intent, not inertia. Firms that succeed won’t just manage occupancy. They’ll cultivate connection, craft community, and above all, design workplaces that people choose—not just endure—to come to.
