Crises are transformation accelerators, as can be seen at the latest when it comes to working from home.

Two years ago it was simply unthinkable in most companies for employees to work anywhere other than on company premises, but working from home is now part of the new normality after Corona: every third company in Hesse allows employees to work remotely, according to a survey by the Institute for the Labor Market - and professional research (IAB).

If you exclude the many small businesses with fewer than 50 employees, the figure is even 73 percent.

Such an upheaval can hardly be reversed, even if so many managers wish for it.

According to another survey, every second of them says that they find it difficult to manage remotely and see working from home as a problem.

However, the answer to this cannot be that all employees should come back to the office because of this.

Maybe that would have been possible 20 years ago.

Companies now have to compete for the few skilled workers available, not the other way around.

That's why employers have to learn to adapt to the wishes of employees - and that includes their desire to work from home.

But that's not the only area where managers have to rethink.

The Corona years have also shown that it is not enough to simply put a computer with software in front of employees and then expect that they will be able to use it.

The employees have to be trained, not only in new technologies, but also, for example, in new forms of cooperation.

It is all the more worrying if this does not happen: According to the IAB study, only 13 percent of all employees in Hesse received further training in 2021, fewer than in 20 years.

This can only be partly explained by short-time work and the consequences of Corona.

Precisely because crises are transformation accelerators, everyone involved has to learn new things faster than usual.

Especially since it has now become even easier thanks to new digital formats.

The prerequisite, however, is that bosses finally accept that they and their employees are adjusting to the changed working methods and accepting this as the new normal.

And that the pre-crisis times will not return.