Employees in the US are returning to the office — for coffee: Rather than attending full days, up to 58% of hybrid employees are stepping into the office for just a few hours before finishing off their actual work duties from home, according to a survey by Owl Labs. This phenomenon, dubbed “coffee badging,” essentially entails dropping by to socialize and build rapport with fellow co-workers a few times a month before heading out again.

Flexibility and trust are key: Aside from the fact that more employees report being more productive when working from home — think less time commuting and fewer in-person distractions — adaptable working hours are the holy grail: Typical working hours “just [don’t] seem all that relevant,” CNBC quoted Owl Labs CEO Frank Weishaupt as saying. But in order to achieve that, trust must be established between employers and their subordinates.

But not everyone is having it. Companies like Meta, Google, Amazon and JPMorgan Chase are doing the opposite by following closely when their employees work — even as some no longer want them on payroll, the Wall Street Journal reported according to CNBC. But this approach is garnering criticism from people like Weishaupt who believe that accountability and leadership should replace this detrimental “grade school” mentality.

Egg freezing is a new work perk? An increasing number of businesses are providing egg freezing for employees, the Financial Times reported. While these benefits were lauded by some as providing support for women and empowering them to have “as many options as possible,” one employee was quoted as saying, they have also come under fire. By providing these benefits, companies are potentially exploiting women’s financial limitations and indirectly hijacking their bodies to serve company interests, detractors of these policies have stated.

Work now, mother later ? Aside from the privacy concerns, some are concerned this move could be a strategy from employers to prompt female employees to delay conception and motherhood. Even though bioethics studies have denied this claim, it is noteworthy to add that these extremely expensive procedures often have limited success rates, the article notes. But it seems to be an attractive option nonetheless:The UK’s Human Fertilisation and Embryo Authority (HFEA) estimates there will be 11 times as many egg-freeze cycles in 2021 as there were in 2011, making this one of the fastest growing medical procedures in the country.

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