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Opinion
Marcus Ashworth and Elisa Martinuzzi

WFH Is Old News. The ‘Near Home’ Office Is the Next Big Thing

StanChart should be lauded for acknowledging that working life has changed forever. But its plans to go beyond WFH may take things a little too far.

A good place for banking?

A good place for banking?

Photographer: COLE WILSON/NYTNS

Standard Chartered Plc is straining every sinew to get ahead of the changes the pandemic might make to people’s work-life balance. Perhaps it’s trying to take things a little too far.

The emerging markets bank says it will “push the boundaries” for half of its 85,000 staff, who work in nine of the 55 countries where it operates. From early next year, it will offer those employees the option of heading to a “near home” location, which it will rent from an office-sharing company. Workers will also have the permanent choice of working from home more.