Hybrid work didn’t fail in property management. What failed was pretending that multifamily operates like a tech company. Kevin A. Weishaar, as a COO and VP of Operations, works with multifamily operators, compliance leaders, and executive teams on operating models, execution, and leadership design.
He’s watched countless organizations struggle with hybrid arrangements, not because remote work is inherently flawed, but because leaders treated it like a workplace perk instead of an operating model.
A capital expense moved slowly, not because anyone was unavailable, but because responsibility was distributed across shared services. The regional was waiting for the manager to clarify the expense need. The approver was waiting for photos or bids from maintenance. Leadership was waiting for reserve eligibility confirmation. Asset management was waiting on a balance from accounting. Accounts payable were pending vendor approval.
Each step made sense on its own, but no one owned the end-to-end decision. When the project stalled, leadership pointed to hybrid schedules. The real issue was an operating model with fragmented accountability.
The Work Itself Is Uneven, Stop Pretending It Isn’t
The first breakdown happens when leaders apply uniform hybrid policies across fundamentally different roles. In multifamily operations, the work varies dramatically by function. Site teams are location-bound, compliance is deadline-driven, and accounting requires long stretches of uninterrupted focus. Asset management bounces between strategic planning and reactive problem-solving.
“Site teams, compliance, accounting, HR, IT, and asset management don’t experience work the same way,” Weishaar explains after working with a regional affordable housing operator attempting to implement company-wide hybrid schedules. “So when leaders apply the same hybrid rule across all of them, friction is guaranteed.”
That friction manifests in resentment, inequity, and operational breakdowns. Site teams feel abandoned when corporate support isn’t available during critical hours. Remote workers feel micromanaged when they’re forced into the office for no clear reason. Middle managers get caught enforcing policies that don’t match operational reality.
The mistake is optimizing for fairness instead of effectiveness. “Hybrid breaks down when leaders optimize for fairness instead of effectiveness,” Weishaar notes. Strong leaders design hybrid by role, not by preference. They’re explicit about which roles need regular in-person collaboration, which benefit from uninterrupted focus, which must happen on-site, and which can happen anywhere.
That clarity reduces resentment because the rationale is operational, not arbitrary. It also protects site teams from feeling disconnected from corporate support.
Manage Outcomes, Not Visibility
The second breakdown happens when leaders default to presence as a proxy for performance. In hybrid environments, weak leadership obsesses over who’s in the office and when. Strong leadership focuses on outputs.
“In hybrid environments, weak leadership defaults to presence. Strong leadership defaults to outputs,” Weishaar says when coaching COOs struggling to measure remote team performance. “The best operators align expectations around leasing results, compliance timelines, accounting turnaround, system stability, and project delivery.”
When outcomes are clear, location becomes secondary. When outcomes are vague, location becomes the battleground. Managers who can’t articulate what success looks like fall back on monitoring visibility, attendance tracking, badge swipes, and Slack status indicators. That surveillance culture drives disengagement and makes hybrid feel punitive instead of strategic.
Fix Handoffs Before You Fix Schedules
The third mistake is implementing hybrid schedules before fixing underlying processes.
“Hybrid amplifies broken processes,” Weishaar emphasizes after seeing multiple operators struggle with this dynamic. “If information lives in people’s heads, hybrid fails. If decisions are unclear, hybrid fails. If documentation is weak, hybrid fails.”
Effective leaders invest in clear workflows, documented procedures, defined decision ownership, and reliable systems of record before rolling out flexible schedules. Once handoffs work, hybrid becomes easier. Without them, no schedule configuration will save you.
This also requires intentionality about in-person time. The best leaders don’t bring people into the office just to sit on emails. “They use in-person time for training, onboarding, complex problem-solving, cross-functional coordination, relationship building, and resetting expectations,” Weishaar notes. Office time becomes high-value, not habitual. That increases engagement and makes the commute worth the effort.
Design the Work, Not Just the Policy
Hybrid isn’t a policy; it’s an operating model. Handled well, it increases focus and reduces burnout. Handled poorly, it creates silos and quiet disengagement.
Weishaar parts with an important message to multifamily leaders, “The leaders getting this right aren’t debating location. They’re designing the work. And that’s the difference.”
Connect with Kevin A. Weishaar on LinkedIn.
