Last year, President Trump placed pressure on U.S. companies to avoid hiring from overseas. Trump's comments led to significant anxiety around offshoring, which combined with big tech’s return to office agenda, has contributed to an aversion against overseas teams.
A poll conducted by Resume Builder surveyed 978 business leaders in October 2025 and found that by 2026, 30% of companies will require employees to be in the office five days a week – up from 28% last year. More companies are building operations that are hostile to global teams.
Companies that try to force employees back into the office not only risk alienating their workers, but they also shut the door on global talent. Forcing a return to office narrows down their hiring pool to those in the local area, and shuts out diverse perspectives on global markets.
Top enterprise teams draw on diverse international talent. Global talent pools provide access to broader perspectives, expertise, and problem-solving capabilities. Thanks to asynchronous working, enterprise leaders can draw on the expertise of professionals working across multiple time zones to deliver with high productivity.
Distributed Working as a Diversity Strategy
Diversity is a top priority for many companies. While some companies approach diversity as a political statement or a cost strategy, it can also provide certain performance advantages. In fact, research shows that employee productivity is 12% higher than in businesses that make no attempt to be inclusive.
From this perspective, narrowing down your team to one locale is a recipe for homogeneity, and potentially building a team that is much more limited in its skill set than it would be if you supported a more global team with distributed working. Distributed working allows employees to work across multiple time zones and locations, and provides access to a highly-diverse range of skills.
“The true advantage of distributed is not diversity for its own sake but access. Distributed teams give companies access to a much broader talent pool, which means hiring faster, hiring better, and executing sooner. Teams that expand internationally are not constrained by local market specifics, growth/work reduction cycles, etc,” Zhenya Rozinskiy, CEO of Mirigos said.
Structuring a team in this way can lead to faster product cycles, stronger delivery, and employee longevity. It also avoids the potential blind spots of local-only hiring, which come from a shallower talent pool. After all, digital products are built for global users, and designing them through a single-market lens is a recipe for disaster.
“From what I’ve learned leading teams globally, diverse companies tend to make better decisions and build more resilient solutions, particularly in engineering environments where innovation is pivotal,” Ranjit Tinaikar, CEO of Ness Digital Engineering said. We lean on this as a strategic asset because our growth as a company is as a result of ideas from teams in every corner of the world.”
Teams that are free to work where they’re most productive,can also support a range of different candidates who might struggle in fully-in office arrangements, such as working mothers, disabled, and neurodivergent workers.
Global Talent Reduces Risk When It’s Integrated — Not Outsourced
It’s easy to forget that not all global teams are the same. There is a big difference between a global team with full-time employees, and one that’s outsourced among contractors. Working with contractors is a great way to gain access to highly-specialized skillsets with low overhead, but it also leads to weaker team alignment and loyalty.
For this reason, business leaders may want to consider ways to help distributed teams connect and collaborate. "Remote work hasn’t just changed where we do our jobs; it’s changed how we work altogether. As a remote leader, I’ve had to rethink how I build real, meaningful connections with my globally distributed team," said Otto Silva, CIO at Kryterion.
"Organizational culture isn’t shaped only in office spaces anymore; it’s built through every intentional interaction we have. A well-structured hybrid model brings out the best of both worlds: the connection that comes from in-person experiences and the focused productivity that remote work allows. But making it work requires leadership grounded in trust and purpose, not oversight or micromanagement." Silva added.
Whether implementing hybrid work or maintaining fully remote operations, regular, but purposeful meetings can help bring employees closer together, even if they’re not in the local area. Likewise, cultivating a collaborative company culture, where employees are encouraged to connect with each other, ask questions, and share expertise can go a long way toward building alignment.
Just because you’re not in an office, doesn’t mean employees can’t build close working relationships. Weekly virtual meetings can help provide an opportunity to socialize and exchange ideas, providing employees aren’t forced to attend. Such meetings also provide a medium to share company news, introduce new team members, and highlight successful projects.
“Leaders should focus on intentionality, flexibility, perseverance, and culture. You need to invest in a clear plan to achieve diversity, be willing to look beyond traditional hiring practices and compensation & benefits models, and then understand that it is a multi-year exercise, not a once-and-done effort. Finally, creating a culture where that diversity feels valued, heard, and represented; hiring diversity is meaningless without a clear path of equity in opportunity and advancement.” Carl Newton, managing director and Global Allshore lead at Slalom said.
The Future of Work is On-Demand Collaboration
The future of work isn’t just work-from anywhere; it’s about on-demand collaboration. Global teams require remote, asynchronous working opportunities that give them the flexibility required to examine problems from a range of cultural perspectives. Embracing remote work is just the start of the journey towards building a high-trust global team.
While big tech’s return to office threatens to wind back the clock, the competitive advantages of building and maintaining global teams will be impossible to ignore long term. Companies that remain fixated on building local teams will inevitably miss not just on the top talent – but diverse talent.
Tim Keary, is a tech journalist based in the United Kingdom, and holds both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in History from the University of Kent. Tim previously worked as Security Editor at VentureBeat and as a Technology Reporter at Technopedia, and his work focuses on AI, cybersecurity, and enterprise technology.
