Insurance, financial services giant The Hartford says workers to begin return to the office in December, in optimistic sign for downtown [Hartford Courant]

The Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. said Friday it will begin bringing employees back to the office in early December, signaling an upbeat note by a major employer headquartered in the city about the winding down of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Senior managers will report back to the office Dec. 6, and the insurer said it expects that “substantially more” employees to be back in the office, starting Jan. 18.

“Recent weeks have brought modestly encouraging signs of progress in the fight against COVID-19,” Suzanne Barlyn, a spokesperson for The Hartford, said. “With health trends improving, we are planning to welcome more employees back to the office.”

The Hartford said it is requiring all employees to report their vaccination status by Nov. 5. The insurer said it is preparing to comply with forthcoming federal COVID-19 vaccine requirement guidelines for large employers. The requirements were mandated by President Joe Biden in September.

Barlyn said The Hartford has closely analyzed the affect of the vaccine and has concluded that “increased vaccination rates are key to reducing the impact of COVID-19 on families, communities, the economy and our country as well as on our own workplace.”

Masks will continue to be required in The Hartford’s offices, Barlyn said.

The Hartford, which employs about 6,100 in Connecticut and thousands in the Hartford area, said initially a “few hundred” managers would come into the office in December with a broader, phased-in return following in January.

In August, The Hartford had said it was delaying indefinitely a planned Oct. 4 return. A small number of employees have been working in the office on a voluntary basis, as well as those who are considered essential to business operations.

The return of office workers to the city has been eagerly anticipated by restaurants and other businesses that depend on workers in the city to contribute significantly to the bottom line.

Restaurants and other retailers in the city were hit hard by the prolonged move to remote working as a strategy to the combat the spread of COVID-19.

City officials see a return of workers as a crucial component in Hartford regaining momentum behind revitalization that was building before the pandemic.

Early on, large employers were optimistic that a return might happen in summer or early fall, but those plans were pushed back by the spread of the highly-contagious delta variant.

Insurer Travelers Cos. Inc., which had pushed back a return from mid-September to mid-October, said this week it still has not set a date for a broader return of it employees. In downtown Hartford, Travelers employs about 7,000.

Even with the prospect of more workers returning, it is becoming apparent that an increasing number of employers are adopting a “hybrid” workplace model that mixes both working at home and coming to the office.

Barlyn said about half of The Hartford’s employees will continue to work from home, as they did before the pandemic.

“Others who worked full-time in the office before the pandemic will move to a hybrid model, going to the office for purposeful activities that are better performed together and working remotely when focused time is needed to accomplish objectives and being in the office isn’t necessary,” Barlyn said.

The office will continue to be the primary workplace for certain jobs, such as “business essential” functions, Barlyn said.

Travelers is giving its employees the option of working at home two days a week. Stanley Black & Decker Inc. is shifting two-thirds of its office employees in Connecticut to work remotely full-time or split between the home and office.

And jet engine maker Pratt & Whitney said up to 80% of its 8,250 salaried employees in Connecticut, or about 6,600, will work remotely full- or part-time, with access to office space when needed. The remaining salaried employees will continue to work full time at the East Hartford campus. The majority of salaried employees in Connecticut worked in East Hartford before the pandemic.

The change does not affect hourly manufacturing workers. Pratt, a unit of aerospace and defense giant Raytheon Technologies Corp., employs 11,000 workers in Connecticut.

Contact Kenneth R. Gosselin at kgosselin@courant.com.

This story was updated at 10:20 a.m. to include more details from The Hartford.

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