Working From Home Megathread

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AdamD wrote: »

Because every benefit you mentioned there is completely irrelevant for somebody in their mid-twenties.

I don't have kids, I don't live somewhere with space for a home office. I didn't have much of a commute before (live near the city center). Our office was good craic socially, for some reason this annoys people on boards, I'm sure somebody will accuse me of relying on work for socialising, I don't. But not socialising from 9-5, 5 days a week is a bit grim in my opinion.

However, I agree a hybrid approach would suit most people, I'd probably choose 2 days at home and 3 in the office in the future.

Hi, my response was a little specific in response to the poster who mentioned schools runs and so on.

I could list many advantages for mid 20's also, which would be applicable to anyone too really. No having to go to the office after mid-week nights out (or concerns over driving in the morning) - being honest this has been one highlighted among a number of my mid 30's friends in that a lot of us would have a few beers on a Sunday night and now there is no thoughts or worries about having alcohol in your system or being over the limit when driving to work on Monday.

Aside from that things like living where you want rather than where the job is located, younger people being able to remain living at home as they can work remotely rather than being forced to house share at high costs in Dublin or other cities and so on.

As for socialising at work, to be honest the forced chit chat at lunch etc can be a pain as much as an enjoyment - I certainly far preferred sitting on the couch watching the masters at lunch today than chatting to people about work (which often happens). After work socialising can still be organised the same as you would organise a night out with friends you don't work with and so on.

I do agree the hybrid model is likely best for many but I certainly think full time work from home makes a lot of sense also for many.

Dyr

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

If only there was some other way to get kids to school other than loading them into the back of an SUV?

Maybe if people picked local schools within walking or cycling distance perhaps?

I know a couple of people who chose city centre schools (Belvedere, Loreto Stephens Green) on the basis of their work commute who are pretty screwed commute wise now, doing twice the journey, twice a day.

I know of a few managers pushing to get people back into the office for just that reason

thomas 123

Just want to chime in as I see the mid 20s being mentioned here.

WFM is great for me, I'm mid 20's. don't need a car, use my non work time to work on personal projects rather than commuting. Most importantly, I do not spend a second of my personal time on activities to do with work(YOLO and all that).

I actually cant think of a detractor. I mean work is for working, and if you are focused on your career thats all you need to be doing.

I work in a very forward thinking company though, plenty of meetings, plenty of benefits, regular updates and interaction from all levels of management - and did so pre-covid, maybe the bad experiences are coming from bad companies or companies not fully behind WFH?

c68zapdsm5i1ru

salonfire wrote: »

There is going to be a longer term impact on the labour pool as well if WFH stays.

15-16-17 years olds filling out their CAO forms are not going to choose an option that is likely to see them working at home after college. People that age don't see beyond 5 years out.

I can't imagine parents would be thrilled either at their college grad son or daughter sitting in a crowded house-share at 22yo stuck at home because their employer has no or limited office space. Or worse still, their grad moving back home to work in their childhood bedroom.

It could cause long term distortion away from office based careers.

Not really sure what your point is. Are you saying that people should sacrifice their family lives, their community lives, their hobbies and interests, and the sustainability of the environment, while mortgaging themselves to the hilt to buy near towns and cities because school leavers want the flatland and office social life experience for a few years in their early twenties?

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Wilson Thousands Viewfinder wrote: »

Hi, I think people of all ages would be happy with the option of working from home, how often they do it may vary but I think its an option that suits everyone at times. Personally I would like to do it all the time but in the long run that would not suit my role something like 2 days in/3 at home per week will be ideal. I have home office in my current home and we are building a house now which I have included a large home office that even 3 people could comfortably work from and I would hope that it will be used heavily in future.

As for dropping kids to school, my toddler is a few years away from starting school yet but when he does the school is 5 mins drive away (we live rurally so no traffic) and my office is 40 mins drive away. I could not see any logic in continuing to the work place just because I did a school run, I think it would be similar for many both rurally or in urban areas. Schools tend to be close to where you live so in most cases dropping and coming back would be far quicker than continuing to work.

The other major major advantage of working from home though is on the other end of the day, the pick ups. You can do the pick-up and save lots of your euros that would be spent on after school care. Once a child gets to 6 or 7 they will happily play themselves or watch television while you go back to work and you can pop out to them if needed.

The same situation would hold for summer holidays and other school term breaks where you could mind kids while working (once they are old enough to potter away themselves), drop and pick form summer camps and so on.

Those who much prefer working from home or a hybrid model are in the majority by a distance but I am still very surprised that there is as big a minority as I am seeing of people who don't like it or aren't seeing the massive advantages.

Sorry but I think parents taking the attitude that they can work from home while minding 6 and 7 year olds is exactly what could ruin it for everyone else.

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Shawn Sparse Sunstroke wrote: »

Sorry but I think parents taking the attitude that they can work from home while minding 6 and 7 year olds is exactly what could ruin it for everyone else.

6 maybe a bit young, depends on the child but 7 onwards should be no issue at all. They are well able to entertain themselves. Especially as it’s only for a few hours in the afternoon.

At what age would you think it’s feasible?

I’ve have used the fact I’m working from home since March many times to help out with our toddler, putting him down for his nap and watching him while my wife goes out and does things, minding him and keeping an eye on emails etc if my wife has appointments and so on. Never has any impact on my productivity but makes a big differed for family and so on.

jrosen

dh's company have committed to shedding office space. They have always had a very generous work from home policy anyway. After weeks of surveys there is no appetite for a full return to the office.

Looking likely the majority of staff will be expected in the office 2 days per week and home 3. There will be wriggle room for a different split depending on role/level. They will rotate desk sharing. Final details still to be hammered out.

Their current contracts already have provisions included for whats expected/agreed around childcare.

An Ri rua

I see Martin Lewis reporting on a major change in HMRC tax strategy in UK.
Even if you are ordered to work one day from home, you can legitimately claim the full tax year.
https://blog.moneysavingexpert.com/2020/04/martin-lewis--working-from-home-due-to-coronavirus--claim-p6-wk-/?_ga=2.93416024.49293085.1605482568-1566002408.1596662880

Wonder will it happen here? To save admin coats in these fluid times.

c68zapdsm5i1ru

Wilson Thousands Viewfinder wrote: »

6 maybe a bit young, depends on the child but 7 onwards should be no issue at all. They are well able to entertain themselves. Especially as it’s only for a few hours in the afternoon.

At what age would you think it’s feasible?

I’ve have used the fact I’m working from home since March many times to help out with our toddler, putting him down for his nap and watching him while my wife goes out and does things, minding him and keeping an eye on emails etc if my wife has appointments and so on. Never has any impact on my productivity but makes a big differed for family and so on.

I think when they're not getting in from school until about 3 ó C and are at an age when they can make themselves something simple to eat like toast or a sandwich and get on with homework etc without constant supervision. If a manager is finding that phonecalls or meetings are being interrupted by a child wanting attention or needing help with something then the more wfh resistant ones will use that to try and drag everyone back into the office full time

plodder

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

If only there was some other way to get kids to school other than loading them into the back of an SUV?

Maybe if people picked local schools within walking or cycling distance perhaps?

I know a couple of people who chose city centre schools (Belvedere, Loreto Stephens Green) on the basis of their work commute who are pretty screwed commute wise now, doing twice the journey, twice a day.

Maybe the pandemic will change some of that. But, the poster I was replying to lives in a rural area. So unless he has a bus service, he may have to keep driving his 'SUV'.

antimatterx

Mr.S wrote: »

I for one, am looking forward to going back to an office a few days a week- mostly, to save on my coffee / food expenses

Yea I'm the same. I work in tech as a developer and it is harder to solve some problems, and have meetings over meet. Sometimes you just need to be beside eachother.

ThunbergsAreGo

I thought I was in favour of a hybrid approach but the closer it comes to going back if I would much prefer 2/3 days a month than a week in the office

Thierry12

Question

Why are the government not incentivising WFH?

Give the employer €50 per person and many companies would send them home

Make WFH employees cheaper than office based

Thats me

Thierry12 wrote: »

Give the employer €50 per person and many companies would send them home

Make WFH employees cheaper than office based

What for? WHF is not more expensive for employer and it is supposed by L5 that everybody whose job can be done from home have to work from home, only essential workers can go to their workplaces. Major companies comply. The rest business are requiring enforcement.

You are not going to offer €50 for not visiting pubs to each of these alcoholics who are struggling in each thread that they lost ability to have a pint with lockdown, you just closing their pubs. Same with businesses: if business making harm to society undermining expensive measures - such businnes should be severely charged or even closed. And this will make it more profitable for business to comply rules.

_Kaiser_

As others have said, it very much depends on a combination of individual factors as to what suits people best.

As I've said before, I can do 100% of my role remotely as I don't have any direct reports anymore and only really regularly deal with maybe 2/3 people in Ireland - the rest being in the UK or further afield.

There's no social life to miss as a result and also the location of the office (edge of Dublin in a business park) means everyone drives anyway, and I was already WFH a day or two anyway so have long since converted one of the bedrooms into a home office.

The company themselves are quite happy with the way things have been working overall but recognise that WFH doesn't suit everyone due for a variety of reasons and will be moving to the hybrid model longer term - currently working out supports for staff at home, and have just cut the office space by 50% thus saving money there too.

I don't ever see myself going back to a full time, in office 9-5 position and have said as much to recruiters lately. Any future role will need to be flexible in terms of hours and onsite requirements.
My days of spending hours unnecessarily commuting to do something I can do just as well from home (generally even better because there's no interruptions etc) are over if I can possibly avoid it.

DSN

Quote

The other major major advantage of working from home though is on the other end of the day, the pick ups. You can do the pick-up and save lots of your euros that would be spent on after school care. Once a child gets to 6 or 7 they will happily play themselves or watch television while you go back to work and you can pop out to them if needed.

The same situation would hold for summer holidays and other school term breaks where you could mind kids while working (once they are old enough to potter away themselves), drop and pick form summer camps and so.[/QUOTE]

This is exactly why employers don't like wfm my kids were 5th/6th before I dropped paid after school care for them (I always wfm) & they get bus home so am not rushing out middle of the day to do pick ups so yeh save maybe 1-2 years childcare but up to that point would be too much distraction.
Wfm def suits me now big time but would have hated it in my twenties most of my life long friends now I met in a job I was in at that time. It was a young company great social life travelled a bit with it etc.

OU812

My wife’s company are after hiring a company to assess their work from home space.

We’ve to orovide video of her workspace and on the company’s recommendation, her employer will buy what she needs.

She’s currently on a mid sized IKEA desk on a 27” monitor with my computer chair in a corner of our family room where our home computer is. Her company already pays the €3.20 a day allowance. They can order what they need from amazon in terms of supplies.

They’re also buying them time from a “wellness” expert to talk about mental health etc.

Her Christmas party is going to be an online thing with entertainment via zoom and a food & drinks package sent to the house.

Meanwhile, I’m sitting at the kitchen table on a 17” monitor, get no allowance & our party has been cancelled...

Sultan of Bling

OU812 wrote:

They’re also buying them time from a “wellness†expert to talk about mental health etc.

OU812 wrote:

Her Christmas party is going to be an online thing with entertainment via zoom and a food & drinks package sent to the house.

OU812 wrote:

Meanwhile, I’m sitting at the kitchen table on a 17†monitor, get no allowance & our party has been cancelled...

I know it all depends on the individual but I'd much rather be in your shoes than hers.

I'm just not into all that, would rather be left alone.

BrianD3

Just wondering what the attitude to WFH is in the public service these days - based on what happened during the summer there must be lots of managers gagging to haul staff back to the office at the first sign of the end of the pandemic, vaccine rollout etc.

I'm aware that many public and civil servants have posted about their WFH experiences on boards with very different experiences being described - depending on the employer, attitude of management etc.

Sultan of Bling

BrianD3 wrote:

Just wondering what the attitude to WFH is in the public service these days - based on what happened during the summer there must be lots of managers gagging to haul staff back to the office at the first sign of the end of the pandemic, vaccine rollout etc.

BrianD3 wrote:

I'm aware that many public and civil servants have posted about their WFH experiences on boards with very different experiences being described - depending on the employer, attitude of management etc.

Our CEO wants us back. We were nearly back in August but then the numbers started going up again.

At the moment she can't bring herself to say it will be next year. She just keeps saying we're monitoring the situation constantly . It's pathetic really.

We have been told we will get at least 4 weeks notice before we return however.

ChikiChiki

Made a decision over the weekend. Not pressure to go back to the office next year. It will be Q3 at the earliest.

Therefore I'm relocating to coastal Spain come February for 6 months. 500 euro a month for an apartment with a balcony on the medditeranean coast as opposed to the 1k a month I am paying in Dublin. They also have really good fibre infrastructure for the wfh stuff so why not.

Should help me save an extra few €€ again next year also.

Shelga

Does anyone else's job involve working with a range of other teams, such that it's kind of either all or nothing when it comes to WFH?

My ideal scenario once the pandemic is over (or at least significantly reduced) would be 2 days a week in the office, and the rest from home. But my work involves gathering lots of teams to work on stuff, so if half of them are WFH and the other half are in the office, how's that going to work?

I hope that there is a real commitment to WFH from employers, and they make real efforts to facilitate meetings with a mix of people in the office and working from home. Say, have bigger screens in meeting rooms so people at home can video call in? Like how Question Time or the Graham Norton Show look these days :pac: Surely they can pay for it ten times over with the money they'll save on office space.

WhiteMemento9

Shelga wrote: »

Does anyone else's job involve working with a range of other teams, such that it's kind of either all or nothing when it comes to WFH?

My ideal scenario once the pandemic is over (or at least significantly reduced) would be 2 days a week in the office, and the rest from home. But my work involves gathering lots of teams to work on stuff, so if half of them are WFH and the other half are in the office, how's that going to work?

I hope that there is a real commitment to WFH from employers, and they make real efforts to facilitate meetings with a mix of people in the office and working from home. Say, have bigger screens in meeting rooms so people at home can video call in? Like how Question Time or the Graham Norton Show look these days :pac: Surely they can pay for it ten times over with the money they'll save on office space.

We did this prior to all this happening. It usually involved a meeting room with a big screen where people could congregate for the call if they wanted or they could dial in from the desk in the office along with all the other people joining the call from other countries or others working from home. Mix and match.

Mushy

Mr.S wrote: »

That's becoming very common.

I wonder what happens if your employer deems your working from home setup unstable though?

Fine for most people, but what about people in flat shares? A fair amount of people (mostly the young employees) in our place are working from the kitchen table still.

Anyone working from home needs to be assessed. The kitchen table would work, but extras would need to be got by the employer to make them compliant.

AdamD

Mushy wrote: »

Anyone working from home needs to be assessed. The kitchen table would work, but extras would need to be got by the employer to make them compliant.

There isn't always space for extras of course. My work wanted to send me a printer at one point, had to say lads - where do you think I'm going to put this?

c68zapdsm5i1ru

Anyone find that dealing with annoying situations is easier when there's a level of detachment from colleagues. I find it much easier now to ignore trivial ego boosting etc and not let it annoy me, but also to politely but firmly let a colleague know if I am genuinely unhappy about something.

When you're n the office every day it's easy to start getting caught up in silly office politics, or to not speak up about something because you don't want to create an atmosphere.

leahyl

I work in the public sector in an open plan office with 7 others - each of us has to do one day a week in the office; we’re not essential like but sure this isn’t the same as the first lockdown *eyeroll - anyway, I think it’s a bit of a waste to go in one day but they just want that hold on us, I feel - not sure if it’s the same in other parts of the company. Was able to claim back the money for a desk I bought in March the other day and they have ordered me a chair for home too - so, I’m thinking that this is going to be a long term thing with a few days working from home and a few days in the office in future? Why else would they be buying chairs for people if we could be getting back to normal in the next few months (hopefully!)?

JDD

BrianD3 wrote: »

Just wondering what the attitude to WFH is in the public service these days - based on what happened during the summer there must be lots of managers gagging to haul staff back to the office at the first sign of the end of the pandemic, vaccine rollout etc.

I'm aware that many public and civil servants have posted about their WFH experiences on boards with very different experiences being described - depending on the employer, attitude of management etc.

I work in the public service - a fairly big entity. They're carrying out a staff consultation at the moment regarding attitudes and ideas for post-pandemic set up. Of course people's wants vary massively. Some staff with children want the option to WFH permanently, only attending the office when there are meetings with outside third parties, or in the final couple of weeks before a project finishes. Other, more younger staff, are chomping at the bit to come back in five days a week. Those are the staff that are paying high rates for a tiny apartment close to the office - and I can see their reasoning. Plus they're fairly junior and it's difficult for them to "learn on the job" without physically being there.

On the whole, my employer has been very cautious about people coming into the office, I wouldn't say they are chomping at the bit at all. However they are health and safety paranoid at the best of times. They've told us that they would only bring people back in one day a week, on a phased basis, and only when we reach Level 1! So that'll be summer next year. And by that stage we might have the more permanent post-pandemic plan in place.

If I were to stake my house on it, I would say that the general set up will be 2/3 days in the office, 2/3 days at home. Those who want to come in 5 days a week will be allowed. Then if you want to stay at home more permanently it will be "up to local management approval" which means you'll have to fight tooth and nail for it.

In reality what will happen is that our local management will start coming in at least four days a week. Publically they'll be saying "Oh of course we are flexible, and look at all the arrangements that we approve. I'd love to WFH four days a week but I couldn't POSSIBLY do it for more than one day a week because that just doesn't suit the type of work that I do", which translates as "I don't think that the work we all do suits a majority WFH arrangement, and I'd better see you in the office for the majority of the week if you ever want to get promoted".

I guarantee it. And everyone will start trickling back in because they'll be worried that a peer will be getting more face time with management and will get the next promotion over them.

Mushy

AdamD wrote: »

There isn't always space for extras of course. My work wanted to send me a printer at one point, had to say lads - where do you think I'm going to put this?

Oh of course, the fun of it. Still likely to be able to do work without the printer surely? I guess by extras I meant laptop risers, monitors...stuff more related to health and safety side

Mrs OBumble

Shawn Sparse Sunstroke wrote: »

Anyone find that dealing with annoying situations is easier when there's a level of detachment from colleagues. I find it much easier now to ignore trivial ego boosting etc and not let it annoy me, but also to politely but firmly let a colleague know if I am genuinely unhappy about something.

When you're n the office every day it's easy to start getting caught up in silly office politics, or to not speak up about something because you don't want to create an atmosphere.

Nope, just the opposite.

Trivial shyte that could have been dealt with in a polite two minute conversation (usually reminding someone about something they've forgotten) now becomes a major drama with managers being cc'd all over the place.