According to Bock, there are two reasons things are more likely to return to the way they were pre-pandemic. First, employees who work remotely will be at a disadvantage when it comes to promotions or pay increases, compared with their in-office peers.

That certainly isn't fair, but it's not surprising. It's harder to evaluate performance when someone isn't physically there all the time. Even if that's not true, there will certainly be a perception that it is. If your colleagues are working in the office full time and you're only there part of the time, it's hard not to wonder what you might be missing. The fear of missing out is real, and Bock suggests it will drive people back to the office eventually.

The other reason is far simpler, though just as problematic: Bosses want employees back in the office. "We'll get everyone back into the office eventually. I just don't want to pick that fight now," Bock says one Google executive told him.

It's no surprise that many managers would prefer to have their team together in person if given a choice. Managing a remote team is hard and introduces different challenges compared with having everyone sitting at desks where you can see them and keep track of what they're working on. Then again, if your primary concern is being able to see your team and what they're working on, you're probably doing it wrong.

Of course, there certainly are benefits to having people who work with each other in close proximity. It's hard to argue that the last two years haven't had a cost. Connecting with a team via Zoom isn't the same as sitting around a table. There are intangible benefits to being together with the people you collaborate with that simply don't exist virtually.

That doesn't mean that working in the office is the only way to be productive. If anything, the last two years have shown that many jobs and roles can be done remotely. The problem is that many of the people who make decisions about how employees work have assumed that remote work was a temporary solution to a temporary problem. Once the pandemic is over, everything will get back to "normal."