The road back to the office is paved with uncertainty. It seems the legal profession, like virtually every other office culture, has a nearly endless appetite for discussing the pros and cons of working from home. We are still debating whether remote work kills morale or improves quality of life, hurts productivity or enables greater focus, or whether it causes employee turnover or is part of a smart retention strategy. Hardly a week goes by without a think-piece on the future of office life or brainstorming how to get employees back in the office. This continued discussion leads to organizations frequently revising their work from home policies and enforcement mechanisms. What we end up with are piecemeal and patchwork policies full of caveats, "subject to further revision," and prone to questions about enforcement.

While this chorus of voices is interesting and hopefully spurred some innovation, at some point the experimentation must end. Three years after the lockdown forced employees to figure out how to work from home, the harm from the uncertainty around this issue can easily outweigh the comparative benefits of finding the optimum work-from-home policy. This is particularly true in the case of younger lawyers, whose fledgling careers—and growing family obligations—will be shaped the most by these policies.