Return-to-office mandates are a clear source of tension in the ad industry these days. Because let’s face it—while some agencies are legitimately embracing remote work, many others would like nothing better than to return to the old pre-COVID-19 days of full-time in-office employment.

Now, Zulu Alpha Kilo—known for its industry parody videos that roll out every year around this time—addresses the issue in hilarious fashion, with a satire that imagines one (thankfully fictitious) agency’s unique solve for the problem.

Forget fully remote. Forget hybrid. This place is going all-in with a third option that comes as a shock to employees, to say the least.

As it did last year with its “Left-Handed Mango Chutney” video satirizing the industry’s obsession with awards, Zulu Alpha Kilo goes right at the uncomfortable truth here—the chasm between what employers and employees generally want in any company-wide return-to-office arrangement. 

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That the staffers eventually give in, even voluntarily embracing the seven-day plan, only to regret it later, adds an extra layer of irony, suggesting the workers are, in some ways, complicit—trapped in a prison of their own making. Younger workers have long fallen into this trap, not just in advertising but elsewhere—feeling compelled to work nights and weekends because that’s the culture and they feel dispensable if they object.

Zulu Alpha Kilo, for the record, has a hybrid work model—two days a week in the office, non-mandatory. And, as it notes at the end of the video, it is staying hybrid. 

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Zak Mroueh, founder of Zulu Alpha Kilo, wrote and directed the “Living From Work” video. The idea, he told Ad Age, popped into his head while he was unable to sleep on a long flight to Australia recently. So, he just started writing. 

“With all the news about hybrid working, I thought, ‘What if a company mandated staff to come in seven days a week?’ With that silly notion, I just kept playing out ridiculous scenarios,” he said. “We landed in Sydney, and by this point I’d been up for over 30 hours. Was it a good script, or was it just the sleep deprivation kicking in? Fortunately, it passed the overnight test. I was excited to bring it to life when I got back to Toronto.”

Mroueh cast actress Carly Heffernan in the lead role. She’d appeared previously in a 2016 spot that Zulu Alpha Kilo made for Interac called “Pets with Credit.” “She is such a major talent and just nailed the character,” Mroueh said.

“I had a lot of fun crafting each joke in the script and then trying new lines on set,” he added. “I love working with talent and feeding them random lines that pop into my head on set. And I also like giving the cast room to ad lib.” 

His favorite part of the process on any film, though, is editing.

“By this point, the creative heavy lifting of coming up with a concept, writing a script, casting the right talent and directing is done,” he said. “The real fun part for me happens in the edit suite.” 

Along with “Left-Handed Mango Chutney,” Zulu Alpha Kilo’s other productions in the same vein have included “Say No to Spec,” about the scourge of spec work in the industry; “World’s Worst RFP,” satirizing the RFP process; “Billy’s Lemonade,” lampooning holding companies; and “Awards Gone Wild,” which imagined if other industries were as obsessed with awards as advertising is.

“We always produce these things on a shoestring budget internally,” Mroueh said, “but I was pleased with how [this new one] turned out.” 

The new video was first screened Thursday night at Canadian marketing magazine Strategy’s Agency of the Year event, which has a long history of commissioning industry parody videos. Zulu Alpha Kilo won Agency of the Year, silver; Design Agency of the Year, bronze; and Digital Agency of the Year, bronze, at this year’s event.