Adapting to working from home: Analysing the impact on Employers in the Netherlands

Abstract

This thesis investigates how the rise of remote and hybrid work has reorganised the office-space strategies of Dutch employers between 1990 and 2025. Drawing on 90 purposefully-sampled newspaper interviews with CEOs, HR directors and facilities managers from major Dutch dailies and trade outlets, it employs qualitative content analysis to analyse shifts across five periods: early telework pilots (1990-2000), incremental adoption (2000-2010), the “Het Nieuwe Werken” era (2010-2019), the COVID-19 shock (2020-2021) and the post-pandemic (2022-2025). Findings show a clear evolution from home-office trials, which were not widely adopted, to a mainstream hybrid model, which now leads to real-estate downsizing across many large organisations. Productivity gains (quiet focus, commute elimination), cost savings, and talent attraction motivate continued support for remote work, while innovation slowdowns, weakened mentoring and cultural and social cohesion remain persistent concerns. Employers mitigate these risks by limiting remote days, staging mandatory “office sprints,” and redesigning their spaces into café-style “clubhouses” that prioritise collaboration over individual desk work. Spatial strategies reveal a nuanced pattern: although some firms experimented with suburban satellites, most ultimately reinvest in well-connected urban cores, striking a balance between prestige and agglomeration benefits. Sustainability is further accelerating reuse projects and energy-efficient renovations over new builds. By analysing the employer's perspective over three decades, this research extends the existing literature on telework, showing how technological, managerial, and cultural factors have influenced long-term spatial change.