Working From Home Megathread

Naos

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Here ya go - one for those of you who laughed at GDPR, and told me that using Citrix from a home network was fine:

https://touch.boards.ie/thread/post/117291818

(This is more extreme 'cos the employee was using their personal laptop. But devious minds can see how similar things could be installed to other devices on a home network. )

And it's a classic case of why you should never use your personal PC for work.

This is not more extreme because it's a personal computer. This simply happened because it's a personal computer that the whole family use.

Citrix would securely log you on to the company network. That has nothing to do with the fact that someone months ago could have been downloading all sorts of ****e from Piratebay, opening random links while browsing the web etc and managed to download a virus.

Psychedelic Hedgehog

Yep, it could just as easily happen to a corporate device that hasn't been properly secured (and indeed, I witnessed a senior manager manage to do so while 100% in the office not that long ago).

Sconsey

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Please do tell us what tools could protect from hacker-installed screen-image capture on a personal PC.

I'm all ears.

Please let me know how you can be so sure that hackers have not broken into the office and hidden cameras that are monitoring device screens.

It seems like you are burrying your head in the sand while the rest of the world moves on. You should do some reading on things like Zero Trust, you determine the risk associated with the activity and the system reacts accordingly. So for example: if someone is accessing a corporate resource that is low sensitivity, from an unknown device, you might ask for extra authentication. If they are trying to do something that is more sensitive, check the IP, check if the deivice has been seen before, ask for more authentication, etc.
You can assess the risk of every action and respond accordingly. And sure in some cases the response might be "Sorry you can't do that on this device", or "sorry you can't do that from the internet", but business and technology is moving on and is offering secure flexibility whether you like it or not.

/Edit: by the way something like Azure Information Protection or many other tools will prevent the screen capture scenario, all this along with conditional access and other tools builds up to a secure posture.

andrew1977

No mention of working from home / return to office in the speech a few minutes ago .

What’s the official guidance on that now based on the increased relaxation of restrictions?
Thanks

Infoanon

andrew1977 wrote: »

No mention of working from home / return to office in the speech a few minutes ago .

What’s the official guidance on that now based on the increased relaxation of restrictions?
Thanks

Autumn. Public Health Advice and Government advise is unchanged.

Previously indicated September.

Leo has just confirmed September, possible staggered return for inductions in August.

Anecdotally ,companies are looking at an Hybrid model 3 day wfh / 2 days in the office

JTMan

Infoanon wrote: »

Leo has just confirmed September, possible staggered return for inductions in August.

Yeah, Reuters report here.

“The message is to continue to work from home if at all possible and we anticipate that is going to be the advice until September,” Deputy Prime Minister Leo Varadkar told a news conference.

“However we will give consideration, if things continue to improve (in managing COVID-19), to some kind of phased return perhaps in August around people going in on a staggered basis or for training or induction or reasons such as that.”

Infoanon

Mr.S wrote: »

September is still the recommended date and you should work from home if you can till then.

In reality, a lot of offices are already opening / open. Our place opens on Monday (with a heap of restrictions) but only for those that want it. I know of a few other large employers doing the same.

Anecdotally I have heard of Directors being reminded of their responsibilities re health and safety of their employees....

doc22

Infoanon wrote: »

Anecdotally I have heard of Directors being reminded of their responsibilities re health and safety of their employees....

Is that a push people back into the office or not:pac:

Infoanon

doc22 wrote: »

Is that a push people back into the office or not:pac:

Not following government health guidance would contravene obligations , aka employees are to work from home where possible.

doc22

Infoanon wrote: »

Not following government health guidance would contravene obligations , aka employees are to work from home where possible.

responsibilities re health and safety extend to WFH and the company in most cases have no knowledge of the employees home suitability vs an office environment...

Antares35

doc22 wrote: »

the company in most cases have no knowledge of the employees home suitability vs an office environment...

Source?

doc22

Antares35 wrote: »

Source?

Well I haven't heard any WFH safety checks during covid :pac:

Antares35

doc22 wrote: »

Well I haven't heard any WFH safety checks during covid :pac:

Yes because on balance that would not have been the safer thing to do in the midst of a pandemic?

I had one over the phone, as I had notified them I was pregnant. Got a call straight away from HR to ask about the safety of my work space etc. They couriered my office chair with ergonomic accessories etc to my home. Obviously they weren't going to conduct a home visit during the pandemic. I'd hardly have entertained them if they asked to. But on balance they did as much as they could given there was the threat of transmitting a potentially life threatening illness to me

Infoanon

doc22 wrote: »

responsibilities re health and safety extend to WFH and the company in most cases have no knowledge of the employees home suitability vs an office environment...

A lot of companies covered off that risk early on , a few went as far as providing office furniture

The risk I was referring to is bringing employees in to the office against government health guidance.

Patsy167

Infoanon

Mr.S wrote: »

The 'where possible' part is very subjective and is not clearly defined, which is why a lot of places are opening up.

For example in our place, we are re-opening up on a voluntary basis and people who don't have a great WFH setup (small work space, house sharing, lives alone etc etc) or have a need to come into the office are now permitted to come back in site. In reality everyone is allowed and our employer isn't stopping anyone from coming in as long as the return to office rules are followed.

That's s fair comment - other countries approach was 'work from home ' no ifs / no buts

Your employer is giving you the choice - that in theory covers him/her if anything goes wrong.
I am aware of some companies asking you to sign a disclaimer if you want to come back into the office.

But let's be honest about this ,everyone knows the true intent of the health guidance - work from home.

Mrs OBumble

Infoanon wrote: »

But let's be honest about this ,everyone knows the true intent of the health guidance - work from home.

The true intent of the guidance was, and is, to lower the number of interactions people have. Even if only 50% do work from home, that's still a 75% reduction in number of interactions.

No restriction needs to be 100% adopted to be effective.

Antares35

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

The true intent of the guidance was, and is, to lower the number of interactions people have. Even if only 50% do work from home, that's still a 75% reduction in number of interactions.

No restriction needs to be 100% adopted to be effective.

Sure they might as well just try to vaccinate 50% of the population so. Better than nothing

doc22

doc22 wrote: »

Well I haven't heard any WFH safety checks during covid :pac:

My employer did this.

Basically sent a survey first, to gauge the suitability of your setup. Based on your responses you were then provided with any items that you were missing e.g. suitable chair, desk, monitors, etc.

This was followed up with a request for 2 pictures taken from different angles, of your work setup.

Following this was an additional survey (post supply of additional bits). This covered things like fire escape routes, ventilation, light etc

Lastly, a 1 on 1 video call with a Occ Health specialist who went through any concerns you might have about your situation, exercises you should be doing, etc. If there was still an issue the specialist arranged additional follow ups after that.

That was my personal experience and I know from a few friends that similar activities were carried out in their employers.

WFH does not free employers of their responsibilities in terms of H&S legislation. Anyone trying to imply otherwise is just simply lying.

On the flipside, anyone who has an employer who has not done this kind of activity is entitled to remind them of their responsibility. The govt did this very early on during the first lockdown

Mrs OBumble

Antares35 wrote: »

Sure they might as well just try to vaccinate 50% of the population so. Better than nothing

Well it would be better than nothing. But not enough.

The scientists still don't know what % is necessary. They were originally hoping for 60-70%, but that estimate has been creeping up - some reading here: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/24/health/herd-immunity-covid-coronavirus.html

Whether WFH reduces the % needed is also unknown. It will undoubtedly reduce in-workplace interactions. But it may lead some people to have more non-work interactions (parents at the school gate, local leisure activities, etc).

Purple is a Fruit

Last few weeks I've been in the office and I really welcomed it. Absolutely lovely to get out of the house for the day and meet colleagues. But nearly six weeks on I'm kinda over it and will be glad to return to WFH at the end of this week. Won't miss the commute. Traffic still pretty heavy so will be absolutely woeful when return to the office is at full capacity (doubt all will go back as before, but plenty will still).

_Kaiser_

Nuts102 wrote: »

I really can't see how its more difficult for managers, for my team anyway its made things a lot easier

In the office you go walking to someone's desk and then to another desk in another part of the building and messages can get mixed up

Then add in the probability you will get caught for small talk on the way to the person and then the small talk with the person you are looking for then you are wasting a few minutes

With work from home the manager just sets up a group chat with everyone who is working on something and everyone is clear on the messages and time is not wasted on small talk

I actually can't see how managers could be finding it more difficult to communicate to the team

I changed companies recently, and like my previous one it's currently fully WFH so all that changed in terms of setup is I got a different laptop.

I did however inherit a new team of staff ranging from relatively new team members, to people who've been with the company for several years.

My first few weeks were like this...

- Listen. Join the daily team calls and get a feel for how things are now
- Setup 1to1s with each of the team to get a feel for their personalities, interests/goals, experience etc
- Talk to my manager about his view of and goals for the team and myself
- Talk to peers both in my wider department and the business for their perspectives
- Join lots of meetings on projects, daily ops and so on to get a feel for the business, the pressures and objectives

After the first month, I started making some changes...

- Redefine the roles within the team to provide more structure and help them understand what they should focus on
- As part of that, identify responsibilities and areas for improvement that individuals can own themselves
- Implement better reporting so that I, the team and my boss have a better view of all the work that's being done and the areas we need to focus on
- Focus on updating the process documentation (or writing it down in the first place) to act as a knowledgebase for the team and a standard way of doing things)
- Support the team in pushing back to the business where necessary (eg: short notice but not critical demands, or stopping the virtual "tap on shoulder" approach) and being available for questions, guidance or even just a chat
- Implement better and more structured comms with the business leads and execs

Without exception, each of the team has said - both to me directly and among themselves - that they are really grateful for the changes and feel more confident in their role and in dealing with the business.

All of this has been done remotely via Teams. None of it has required me (or the team) to be sitting at a desk over an hour away.

Mrs OBumble

Deleted User wrote: »

My employer did this.

Basically sent a survey first, to gauge the suitability of your setup. Based on your responses you were then provided with any items that you were missing e.g. suitable chair, desk, monitors, etc.

This was followed up with a request for 2 pictures taken from different angles, of your work setup.

Following this was an additional survey (post supply of additional bits). This covered things like fire escape routes, ventilation, light etc

Lastly, a 1 on 1 video call with a Occ Health specialist who went through any concerns you might have about your situation, exercises you should be doing, etc. If there was still an issue the specialist arranged additional follow ups after that.

That was my personal experience and I know from a few friends that similar activities were carried out in their employers.

WFH does not free employers of their responsibilities in terms of H&S legislation. Anyone trying to imply otherwise is just simply lying.

On the flipside, anyone who has an employer who has not done this kind of activity is entitled to remind them of their responsibility. The govt did this very early on during the first lockdown

Very glad to hear that some employers are actually doing this.

Curious though, what would your employer have done if they found that your WFH setup was unsafe, and your accommodation didn't have capacity to provide a safe setup?

krissovo

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Very glad to hear that some employers are actually doing this.

Curious though, what would your employer have done if they found that your WFH setup was unsafe, and your accommodation didn't have capacity to provide a safe setup?

We had a similar assessment, 3 in my team failed and basically they moved on to a next stage of the process that involved a consultant or interior designer depending on the circumstances. We had a budget of $1000 available for changes. Only one of those was not able to be resolved so they basically went back to the office. The other 2 were accommodated with a little room re-design and innovative desk/chair solution and they are more than happy with the result.

The only employees generally that were not able to be fully resolved were typically young and in complex house shares especially in Asia where multiple generations of family were in the same house. If the offices were shut they given paid leave, if the office was open and they had relocated since the pandemic and there was no local office available they were granted unpaid leave.

In Ireland our 1000 seat campus has only 5 employees who failed the assessment and have a desk, In India the 5000 seat campus has ~750 employees. Our California HQ has only 12 from 4000 seats.

limnam

krissovo wrote: »

We had a similar assessment, 3 in my team failed and basically they moved on to a next stage of the process that involved a consultant or interior designer depending on the circumstances. We had a budget of $1000 available for changes. Only one of those was not able to be resolved so they basically went back to the office. The other 2 were accommodated with a little room re-design and innovative desk/chair solution and they are more than happy with the result.

The only employees generally that were not able to be fully resolved were typically young and in complex house shares especially in Asia where multiple generations of family were in the same house. If the offices were shut they given paid leave, if the office was open and they had relocated since the pandemic and there was no local office available they were granted unpaid leave.

In Ireland our 1000 seat campus has only 5 employees who failed the assessment and have a desk, In India the 5000 seat campus has ~750 employees. Our California HQ has only 12 from 4000 seats.

It seems companies are capable of finding solutions to problems.


Who knew.

Mrs OBumble

limnam wrote: »

It seems companies are capable of finding solutions to problems.


Who knew.

Including providing suitable working space. Who would ever imagine that a company might be responsible for doing that!


Will be interesting to see how some full-time WFH people feel when their companies decide they are really contractors, not employees. Because that is the logical next step if they aren't controlling the exact hours you work.

ELM327

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Including providing suitable working space. Who would ever imagine that a company might be responsible for doing that!


Will be interesting to see how some full-time WFH people feel when their companies decide they are really contractors, not employees. Because that is the logical next step if they aren't controlling the exact hours you work.

Companies can decide all they like, revenue are pretty clear on who is PAYE vs who is contractor


https://www.revenue.ie/en/employing-people/becoming-an-employer-and-ongoing-obligations/guide-to-pay-as-you-earn-paye/determining-the-employment-status-of-an-individual.aspx

jakiah

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Will be interesting to see how some full-time WFH people feel when their companies decide they are really contractors, not employees. Because that is the logical next step if they aren't controlling the exact hours you work.

You talk some amount of ****e. You must be retiring soon, hopefully that will give us all a break from hearing your 1970's-era outlook on work.

Quin_Dub

ELM327 wrote: »

Companies can decide all they like, revenue are pretty clear on who is PAYE vs who is contractor


https://www.revenue.ie/en/employing-people/becoming-an-employer-and-ongoing-obligations/guide-to-pay-as-you-earn-paye/determining-the-employment-status-of-an-individual.aspx

Pretty much impossible for a WFH member of staff to be classified as a contractor based on those details.

krissovo

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Including providing suitable working space. Who would ever imagine that a company might be responsible for doing that!


Will be interesting to see how some full-time WFH people feel when their companies decide they are really contractors, not employees. Because that is the logical next step if they aren't controlling the exact hours you work.

Most companies I work with view the majority of their employees as their most valuable assets and are ploughing serious investment into making the workplace as attractive as possible and keeping the employees. I think you will find the opposite in many cases unless you are dead wood or are on the first couple of rungs of the career ladder.