Operational context NOVA Economics is a specialist economic and
development consulting firm which employs 120 people, the consultants are
all economists, financial analysts and computer scientists. Most of the staff are
between their 30s and mid-40s many with master’s degrees and some with
PhDs. Founded in 2002, NOVA Economics provides clients with the in-depth
expertise and analysis necessary to make the right choices. The consultants
combine a deep understanding of the Southern African business and policy
context with specialist skills in international trade, public policy and regulation,
competition economics and climate change. The work is very technical,
involving large amounts of data analysis. Where NOVA Economics does not
have specialist skills in-house, the consulting firm was able to draw on a
network of local experts and academics as well as their strategic business
partners in Australia and Europe. Before lockdown, staff were used to remote
videoconferencing with clients, and company policy allowed working from
home one day a week, but this wasn’t particularly commonplace. The
Managing Director Yash Ramkolowan commented that ‘even if once a week
someone would work from home, the rest of the team would be in the office,
so it did have the feeling that most people were in the office most of the time.’
In terms of flexible hours, there was already a culture of flexing the start and
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, end of the day, both for work–life balance needs and to enable meetings with
“THEIR” clients in different time zones. While some staff made use of this,
many also worked traditional office hours, and core hours of 11.00 to 15.00
were in place. The type of knowledge work done by NOVA Economics could
hardly be better suited to working from home, or indeed to flexing hours; as
Yash commented: ‘In terms of our client needs, there isn’t any specific need to
be in the office or producing from very set hours. A lot of the work that we do is
quite internally focused.’ The consultants’ work is also mostly highly plannable:
they speak regularly to clients but have a good deal of autonomy over when
those calls take place. However, when the pandemic enforced total, five-days-
a-week homeworking, something was lost from team communication. Head of
HR Kate Dabula commented: ‘There is no substitute for that soft social
interaction that happens by default, when you are in the office together.
There’s something that just isn’t the same, and we haven’t found that magic
button to replace it yet.’ Even for extremely motivated, high-performing
knowledge workers who are ‘really engaged in the subject matter’ Kate said,
‘Some of that energy that you get from being together as a team, it’s much
harder to replicate when you’re at home. However, I am surprised that it is not
impacting on their work. The deadlines still get met, the quality of work is
there, but there’s a sort of energy around it, an excitement, a feeling, when
you’re in the office. We noticed a slump. There was also an impact on
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