Two years after Trip.com, China’s most popular travel platform, implemented a “3+2” hybrid work model allowing employees to work from home two days a week, over 70% of its workforce have adopted the flexible approach. The system is especially popular among younger employees, parents, and women, according to a new report from the company.

The report shows that nearly 80% of employees choosing remote work were born in the 1990s and 2000s, with 21% in team leader positions. Additionally, 63% of fathers and 58% of mothers have opted for a hybrid work arrangement, with women making up for 59% of those seeking hybrid work each week.

While over 80% of employees favor working from home on Fridays, one in four employees opts to do so on both Wednesdays and Fridays. The “3+2” system, allowing employees to choose where they would work from on Wednesdays and Fridays, was introduced in February 2022 following a six-month trial.

According to Trip.com, the initiative has resulted in employees gaining an additional 100 hours of sleep annually and a reduction of over 400 tons in carbon emissions. “Promoting hybrid offices not only improves employee satisfaction without affecting efficiency, but it also helps to reduce traffic congestion, protect the environment, and contribute to family harmony and women’s career development,” Trip.com chairman Liang Jianzhang stated in the report.

Remote working in China surged during the COVID-19 pandemic, when businesses were compelled to explore flexible work arrangements. Before 2020, fewer than 10% of Chinese companies permitted remote work, but this rose to nearly 30% during the pandemic, a 2022 survey by online job platform Zhilian Zhaopin found. The survey also found that nine out of 10 jobseekers seek remote work options.

Despite its benefits, some employees also reported longer working hours under the hybrid model. Trip.com data indicates that approximately half the employees working from home believe their work time has increased by 30 minutes to two hours per week.

Moreover, the absence of face-to-face communication may sometimes lead managers to extend daily or weekly meeting times to monitor employees’ work progress.

He Zeyin, a 25-year-old programmer in the eastern city of Hangzhou, prefers working from home only two to three days a month, despite his employer not enforcing a strict attendance policy.

“The home becomes the office, making it easy to get distracted by household chores and trivial matters while working. Also, it’s easy to think about work during personal time, blurring the lines between work and life,” he said.

Editor: Apurva.

(Header image: The Trip.com Group's headquarters in Shanghai,Feb. 4, 2021. Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Image/VCG)