Ways of working template

Remote & Hybrid Work Survey Template

A survey for distributed and hybrid teams covering connection, communication, meeting load, home setup, boundaries, visibility for promotion, and whether your hybrid policy is actually working for the people living under it.

16 questions 4 min to complete Twice a year Remote and hybrid employees
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When to use it

Run it before you change a hybrid policy, and again three months after. The most common failure in hybrid design is deciding office days from headquarters without ever measuring who they cost the most.

The full question set

Copy these as they are, or adapt the wording to your organisation — just keep it identical between waves, because changing a question resets its trend line.

Pattern

  • 1.What is your usual working pattern?Options: Fully remote · Mostly remote · Even split · Mostly in office · Fully in officeMultiple choice

Connection

  • 1.I feel connected to my team even when we are not in the same place.1–5 scale

Communication

  • 1.I know what my colleagues are working on.1–5 scale
  • 2.Important information reaches me even when I am not in the office.1–5 scale
  • 3.Decisions are documented in places I can find later.1–5 scale

Meetings

  • 1.Roughly how many hours a week do you spend in meetings?Options: Under 5 · 5–10 · 10–15 · 15–20 · Over 20Multiple choice
  • 2.Most of my meetings are a good use of my time.1–5 scale

Focus

  • 1.I have uninterrupted time to do focused work.1–5 scale

Setup

  • 1.My home working setup lets me work comfortably.1–5 scale

Boundaries

  • 1.I can maintain healthy boundaries between work and personal time.1–5 scale

Proximity bias

  • 1.People who work remotely have the same opportunities for growth and promotion.1–5 scale

Policy

  • 1.Our current office/remote policy works well for me.1–5 scale
  • 2.The days I come into the office are worth the commute.1–5 scale

Retention

  • 1.I would look for another job if our remote policy became more restrictive.1–5 scale

Open

  • 1.What is the hardest thing about working the way we currently work?Open text
  • 2.What is one thing that would make distributed work better here?Open text

How to run it well

  • Segment results by working pattern (fully remote, hybrid, office-based) — that split is the whole point.
  • Also segment by tenure: people who joined remotely have a systematically different experience.
  • Ask about meeting load in hours, not in satisfaction — the number is harder to argue with.
  • Share the results before announcing any policy change, not after.
  • Watch the proximity-bias question closely; a low score there predicts remote attrition.

Questions people ask

How do we measure whether hybrid is working?

Compare the same engagement questions across working patterns. If fully-remote employees score materially lower on connection, information flow or promotion fairness, your hybrid model is functioning as an office model with exceptions — which is the most common failure mode.

What is proximity bias and how do we detect it?

Proximity bias is the tendency to favour people you physically see. The detection question is whether remote employees believe they have equal access to growth and promotion. Cross-check the answer against your actual promotion data by working pattern; the two disagreeing is itself the finding.

Should we survey before or after changing our policy?

Both, and say so. Surveying only afterwards reads as justification. Surveying before gives you a defensible basis for the decision and materially improves how the change lands, even for people who dislike it.

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