Concurrents – Environmental Psychology: Benefits of Office Bonding

by Sally Augustin, Ph.D. | November 1st, 2021

A September 8 article in the New York Times (Kellen Browning and Erin Griffith, “If You Never Met Your Co-Workers in Person, Did You Even Work There”) sheds light on a pandemic-era phenomenon—people who have started and resigned from those jobs, all since the COVID lockdown began. Browning and Griffith’s work confirms the important interpersonal bonds that form based on in-person, in-office meetings—and that there are some things that just don’t happen, and can’t happen, in a Zoom session.  They report that, “The coronavirus pandemic, now more than 17 months in, has created a new quirk in the workforce: a growing number of people who have started jobs and left them without having once met their colleagues in person. . . Never having to be in the same conference room or cubicle as a co-worker may sound like a dream to some people. But the phenomenon of job hoppers who …