When will office workers return?

WHEN WILL most people be back at the office? As with Tantalus and the fruit tree, the prize seems to be close, only to recede out of reach. A survey conducted by Morgan Stanley, an investment bank, found that employees have adjusted their expectations for when they are likely to repopulate their desks, moving the date back from April to June. Given the slow pace of vaccinations in some countries, even that may be optimistic.Companies have also had to adjust their expectations. Brian Kropp of Gartner, a research and advisory firm, says that businesses have gone through three phases. In the first, during the spring of 2020, they thought that the pandemic would be short-lived and that corporate life would soon return to normal. In the second, economic restrictions seemed set to last indefinitely and companies figured there was little point in planning for a post-pandemic world. In the third, current, stage the vaccines have brought hope of a reversion to normality, and businesses are trying to work out what the new world will look like.