Hybrid Work’s Missing Ingredients: Community, Ideas, Relationships

"All real living is meeting," goes a line from Martin Buber's book “I and Thou,” published in 1923. It’s hard to imagine him lying there on the picturesque hills below the vineyards of Heppenheim, coming up with that sentence and thinking:

"Oh, that would be so relevant to hybrid work one day."

But if he did, he would be right. Buber’s core idea is that genuine human existence emerges through our encounters and relationships with others. 

Over a century later, that concept may be more relevant than ever since we have more ways to communicate, more opportunities to stay in touch, and more people within reach than at any other point in history. Yet somehow, many of us are also becoming increasingly lonely. 

And the workplace might be holding the key to that paradox.

Living in a Connected Disconnectedness

In her 2011 book “Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other,” sociologist and psychologist Sherry Turkle popularized the expression "alone together."

Simply put, we have more contacts and more ways to contact others than ever before, but arguably fewer opportunities for genuine encounters. A message, a reaction, a video call or a comment can keep us connected, but they don't necessarily provide the same sense of presence and belonging as being with another person. 

And the problem’s implications extend beyond its merely philosophical dimensions. The World Health Organization estimates that around one in six people worldwide experiences loneliness, with young people among the most affected. At the same time, research consistently links meaningful social connection to better health and well-being, and even to a lower risk of premature death.

In that sense, the fact that we spend roughly a third of our lives working (approximately 90,000 hours over a lifetime) makes the question of how we work increasingly important for our physical and mental well-being. So, if work occupies such a significant part of our lives, what role can the workplace play in creating the kinds of meaningful encounters that are becoming increasingly difficult to find elsewhere?

For years, the conversation around hybrid work has largely focused on productivity. Can people work just as effectively from home? Which tasks require physical presence? How many days should employees spend in the office?

But, in light of all said above, perhaps it is worth asking also: What can people get from being together that they can’t get alone?

The answer, according to some of our members, has surprisingly little to do with desks.

The Office as a Relationship Hub

"Most of the people in our team come to the office for socialization. If they need to get work done, they often prefer staying at home," shares Zoran Arsovski, CEO of VertoDigital.

Zoran’s observation captures a broader shift in the role of the workplace. For many professions, deep, individual work can happen almost anywhere, provided that there is access to a laptop, a stable internet connection and a quiet room. The office, on the other hand, offers the opportunity to meet people, exchange ideas, build relationships and feel part of something larger than your own team or even your own company.

And often, these interactions happen naturally, without being planned at all. For Liza Vasileva, Country Manager at Storytel, Campus X’s shared spaces contribute significantly to this. They create opportunities to encounter people she would otherwise never have met.

"Even when I decide to go grab a lunch alone, I end up talking to new, welcoming, and interesting people."

A small interaction, but that is precisely the point since not every meaningful social connection begins with a networking event, a calendar invitation or a carefully structured team-building activity. Sometimes, it just starts with sitting at the same table.

Over time, these seemingly insignificant encounters can evolve into micro-communities - groups of people who recognize each other, exchange ideas, share experiences and gradually develop a sense of belonging.

There is also a snowballing effect. The more familiar people become with one another, the easier it becomes to start a conversation. The easier it is to start a conversation, the more likely new relationships are to form. And the more relationships form, the more reasons people have to come back.

In that sense, the office can become less of a destination for work and more of a hub for relationships.

Proximity Doesn’t Equal Community

Of course, putting people in the same building doesn’t automatically create a community. People can still move through the same space while remaining firmly inside their own bubbles. 

In fact, we can go so far as to say that a busy office can often be surprisingly lonely. And that’s because genuine connection requires more than physical proximity. At the end of the day, if people are going to make the effort to commute to an office, the experience needs to offer something they can’t easily get at home. Bringing everyone into the same room just to spend the day on individual video calls misses the point. Instead, the physical workplace needs to make being together worthwhile.

Key ingredients for this are having spaces that encourage interaction, people who actively facilitate those connections, a culture in which saying hello to someone you don't know feels natural, and events and shared experiences that give people a reason to interact in the first place.

Liza and her team at Storytel see the events at Campus X as a kind of mini team-building experience. Beyond providing a break from the work routine, they create opportunities for people to interact in a different setting and strengthen relationships among individual members.

Furthermore, it is worth noting that relationships rarely emerge from a single conversation, but are instead built through repeated exposure, shared experiences and small moments of familiarity. And that is something the office, when intentionally designed and managed, can facilitate remarkably well.

Empirical evidence supports these observations. A 2025 study examining the influence of coworking on wellbeing and performance found that working from a coworking space was associated with higher levels of wellbeing, productivity and work engagement compared with working from home. The researchers went so far as to suggest that organizations offering remote-work options should consider encouraging or supporting employees' use of coworking spaces.

Importantly, the study also found that face-to-face collaboration had a positive impact on both wellbeing and work engagement. In other words, the benefits of being around other people extend beyond casual conversation and live collaboration itself can contribute to how engaged and well people feel at work.

Sparking Creativity, Building Bridges, Boosting Collaboration

"The vibe at Campus X brings together people with ambitions and ideas," shares Dayana Tsvetkova, Head of People at OfficeRnD. "The feeling that you are a part of a community and the networking opportunities unlock significant added value."

Dayana’s observation is a testament to the fact that the value of coming to the office often lies in the people you didn't plan to meet.

When everyone works from home, your professional network can easily become limited to the people already in your calendar as you collaborate with your team, message your regular contacts, and attend meetings with people you already know.

Physical communities, on the other hand, introduce an element of randomness back into professional life. You might overhear a conversation that sparks an idea or discover that another company is solving a problem similar to yours. You might even meet someone with a completely different skill set who can offer a new perspective or simply have a conversation that makes you look at your own work differently.

For Sourcelab’s Chief Value Creation and CEO, Jeroen Van Hertum, these connections have translated into concrete partnership opportunities with other companies within the Campus X ecosystem, including tech consultancies, business intelligence service providers, and more.

In that sense, access to the right community - one where people can continually benefit from know-how, partnership opportunities, inspiration, and support - can be one of the strongest reasons to leave the home office. And perhaps that is where the future of the office lies - not in being the place where work must happen, but in being the place where people want to make things happen together.

Invaluable "In-Between" Moments Can Defy All Productivity Metrics 

Some of the most valuable interactions at work can’t be manufactured online because they depend on coincidence, proximity and openness. For example, a five-minute conversation after a meeting can lead to a new idea, or a chat over coffee can reveal that two people are working on related problems. Sitting next to someone from another company can lead to a partnership months later, and even a shared lunch can create a sense of familiarity between people who might otherwise never have crossed paths.

And that’s one reason socializing deserves to be considered a legitimate part of the hybrid-work equation rather than a distraction from productivity. Human relationships aren’t an optional layer added on top of work but a way to influence how comfortable people feel asking for help, sharing unfinished ideas, giving feedback and collaborating.

Importantly, the benefits can extend beyond one's immediate team. In a coworking environment, for example, the person sitting at the next table may work in marketing, software development, finance or design and have an entirely different network and perspective. You don't necessarily come to the office intending to meet that person - you simply happen to be there at the same time.

Over time, repeated low-stakes encounters can turn strangers into familiar faces, familiar faces into acquaintances, and acquaintances into friends, mentors, collaborators or business partners. That progression is difficult to measure on a productivity dashboard, but it is part of what makes a workplace feel like a community rather than simply a place where work happens.

Designing Work Around Human Connection

If hybrid work is here to stay, the question isn't whether people should work remotely or from the office but how we can make both work better.

For companies, that may mean becoming more intentional about when people come together. Instead of asking employees to commute only to join video calls from a different location, office days can be designed around the activities that genuinely benefit from being together (e.g., team discussions, workshops, onboarding, mentoring, celebrations, creative sessions, and social events).

For coworking spaces, it means creating environments where connection can happen naturally rather than relying exclusively on formal networking events. A thoughtfully designed office can give people reasons to leave their homes without forcing them into an outdated nine-to-five routine and offer comfortable spaces to focus, places to recharge, opportunities to eat together, and, perhaps most importantly, a social environment for turning physical proximity into actual interaction.

In that sense, the goal of hybrid work shouldn't be to recreate the office experience at home or to force everyone back into the office every day but to give people the freedom to choose the environment that serves a particular need. For individuals, it may be maintaining the flexibility to choose how and where to work - for example, if the task requires uninterrupted concentration, home might be the better choice.

On the other hand, if the goal is to brainstorm, solve a difficult problem together, meet someone new, or simply feel connected to others, coming into the office can offer something a video call can’t fully replicate.

And perhaps that is the overlooked benefit of hybrid work - instead of choosing between the freedom of working alone and the structure of working together, you simply get both. In a world where technology makes it increasingly easy to communicate without being physically present, the office can offer the opportunity to not only become a part of a mass collective, but, as Buber put it - to engage in “a  direct, mutual, person-to-person dialogue where individuals truly meet each other as whole, unobjectified beings.”