The Best of Both Worlds: Sparrow’s Hybrid Model

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 The idea is simple: if one of our teammates wants to come into our office, they’re welcome to. If they’d prefer to stay at home and work remotely, that’s fine too. If employees aren’t based in the same city as our headquarters, that’s also not an issue–they’ll do home office everyday. It’s not a revolutionary concept, but in a time of endless editorials pushing for one model or another, we’re happy to have a decisive answer on the question (and our employees appreciate it as well).

The benefits for Sparrow’s team are clear: the flexibility derived from a hybrid model allows for much higher levels of autonomy and a greater degree of control over the work-life balance. A hybrid model also lets employees cut down on commute time if they choose, giving them more productive hours in the day and a statistically higher amount of job satisfaction. For parents, this autonomy is particularly important – the flexibility we provide empowers our teammates with children to allocate their time as they need.

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While the comforts of home will never beat the amenities of the office (no matter how nice our office is), Sparrow empowers our teammates with any equipment they need to keep them comfortable and productive in their home office.

Productivity and Performance in a Hybrid Environment

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 Sparrow’s performance focus is on outcomes over hours. For us, it’s not about how many days you’re in the office and whether or not you work an unbroken eight-hour shift. In fact, employees work longer on average when they’re at home–and they’re able to manage distractions better, too. From our own observations, our anecdotal experience aligns with the current data. People are more responsive, more proactive, and generally more energetic about work when they’re given the freedom to choose their work location.

It’s true that measuring productivity can feel harder at times when employees work from home, but that’s why it’s important to deconstruct the traditional metrics of what productivity looks like. By putting the focus on outcomes rather than simply hours spent visibly working, Sparrow shifts the narrative of productivity, freeing up our employees to accomplish the things that truly drive the company forward. Like a majority of employers, we prefer to trust our employees to accomplish their tasks, rather than relying on them to use a cumbersome time-tracking system.

With hybrid working a trust-based reporting system, Sparrow still manages to meet all of our targets – and even achieve some with double the projected values. That proves to us that success is measured in meeting goals and delivering results, and if that can be accomplished by only coming into the office every once in a while, then it’s an effective strategy.

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Maintaining Collaboration and Company Culture

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Every model has its downsides, and a hybrid working model is no different. Aside from productivity measurements, there’s a human cost as well–loneliness is an ever-present issue. A  persistent disconnection from the office life can lead to a feeling of being disconnected from your coworkers and the company culture at large, which puts a damper on collaboration and communication. There are solutions, however, that can solve (or mitigate) these issues.

In addition to the usual communication and collaboration tools like Slack, Figma, and Miro, Sparrow puts an emphasis on in-person team events to boost cohesion, morale, and the collaborative spirit. Team dinners are one of our favorite ways to bring everyone together and disconnect from work a little. That’s not all, of course–it takes more than a meal here and there to make a team. That’s why we enjoy organizing larger team trips, so that all of Sparrow can meet up (without laptops!) in a new place and bond through some shared experiences.

In 2024, for instance, we flew everyone out to Croatia for a long weekend of adventure. We took photo tours through Croatia’s longest mountain range, explored national parks, and dove into the local culture (complete with delicious food and a little wine). We did it as a team–these new experiences bring us closer together and replenish the social batteries that get a little low during lots of remote work. Afterwards, we comeback to our work with a stronger sense of collaboration, connectivity, and company culture.

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The Future of Work at Sparrow

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 Moving forward, we see no reason to change our hybrid model–we’ll only continue to improve upon it. Research shows that our teammates aren’t unique in enjoying the flexibility and improved work-life balance–in one study, 98% of respondents wanted the option to work remotely for the rest of their careers, and a further 98% polled would recommend remote work to others.

Though Sparrow values the current state of research when making workplace decisions, at our core, it’s our employees that drive these choices. With our teammates’ happiness and productivity at the core of our hybrid strategy, the key ingredient to optimizing and iterating is employee feedback. We semi-monthly standup sessions to check in with everyone and get a sense for the efficacy of the current arrangement. Additionally, we’ve got an open-door policy for feedback–our employees are welcome (and encouraged)to speak to the management team directly when something needs adjusting.

We’ll continue to adapt to our teammates’ needs, whether that be more frequent in-person events, different communication tools to keep everyone connected, or a greater emphasis on check-ins and feedback rounds.

Join Our Team!

Interested in experiencing Sparrow’s hybrid working model for yourself? We’re always looking for qualified, professional candidates to join our team and bring the future to spare parts management. Take a look at our Careers page and see if any open positions are the right fit for you!

 Find Your Next Role   

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