Offices Reopening-Will you go?

Trampas

It’s not just the office. It’s how you get there. Hopefully out of this companies realise you don’t need everyone sitting in and office dressed in formal wear to make a business work. How much does office space cost?

Companies could save a fortune by reducing their required office space if more worked from home and had complete hot desk setup.

I’m already a 2-3 day week working from home and won’t be rushing back into office as long as social distance is an issue. Standing on a train for 30-40 minutes a day isn’t my cup of tea. My role isn’t a office based requirement

Unearthly

Been told unofficially that the building can't do social distancing safely with 1500 odd people so expect work from home til social distancing is eased.

I'm happy with that. Hate the office

lawred2

trapp wrote: »

Anyone expecting to live life without risk is living a fairytale.

Without meaning to be blunt if you want to stay at home indefinitely while others get back to work you might have to give up your job.

The virus will not be going away.

Measures will be taken to ensure as little transmission happens as possible but the virus will still spread, hopefully in a limited way.

What real measures can be taken in the context of a busy office if everyone has gone back to work?

Now that I think of it, this could do wonders for floor space costs and commercial investment portfolios if social distancing is to become the norm in offices.

The thought of being at home for another 6/12 months is not something making me particularly happy.

weemcd

I wouldn't be Fùckin fussed on it at this point, if we all return to work cases will skyrocket and any lockdown so far will have been for nothing.

Until transmission of cases is down, and I mean really down along with deaths, it's not a good idea.

I would think measures need to be in place for a while longer yet, and proceed with extreme caution. I wouldn't feel very safe getting public transport then getting into an office where you've no guarantee people are cleaning their hands properly, distancing properly etc etc etc.

rn

Couple of points, most raised in other posts.

Having most people back increases the risk of a sick workforce, even with social distancing. Employer will have to decide themselves if it's worth risk, as it's likely employees will be absent for 2+weeks for recovery.

Half in office, half out is the most expensive way to run office. Per head costs are doubled. If no one is in office space light and heat costs can be reduced greatly.

Every company will have to rethink their office strategy out of this. I can see a lot more IT work going across the world as a result and less reliance on local markets to fill positions. I can see a lot of IT based organisations bringing their office foot print way down.

Childcare, parent care. There's still a significant minority who have home care requirements and can't really leave home as a result.

High risk category. There's a significant minority who are recovering/recovered from cancer, cardiovascular problems and other conditions and diseases who should be cocooning right now.

Both of these groups might not be able to take unpaid leave and their employer can't afford to have them gone anyway. These will have to be accommodated via WFH.

Public transport risk. If these people are restricted from office, it will put pressure on private transport and car pooling.

Sending everyone home or calling everyone back is easiest option. Having a split is tough call and tricky to manage.

voluntary

Not really afraid that much about going back to work. Worried however about getting there. Thingking about getting on crowded DART/LUAS is terryfying at this stage.

I absolutely will go. I cycle in so no public transport challenges. I’m not staying home for a moment longer than I have to

c68zapdsm5i1ru

Murphman88 wrote: »

Cases of people now being infected a second time so wouldn't bet on immunity.

Is that true? I thought it was just that there's as yet no evidence that you can't get it again.

c68zapdsm5i1ru

By the way the Govt want a minimum of twenty per cent of public servants to be working from home in future. So I presume they're trying to lead the way in making wfh a norm in the long term.

stephenjmcd

Working from home at the moment but it's not a long term solution for me, so when the office opens I'll be going in.

amadangomor

pgj2015 wrote: »

when you think about it, the best situation for you is if you get the virus, then you can self isolate for 2 weeks, then you can visit your parents safely.

This amounts to medical advice which you cannot give here. Also he can't visit his parents under current regulations.

Hani Kosti

Still cycling to the office one day a week (and it works wonders for my sanity). Social distancing in the office is working fine, we're in a 5 storey building and access is restricted to one floor only. On site gym and café closed for time being.
The plan is to have week on/off once return to the office is allowed for several weeks.
I am trying to get WFH access for last 4 years so now will definitely fight harder than ever.

antimatterx

rn wrote: »

Couple of points, most raised in other posts.

Having most people back increases the risk of a sick workforce, even with social distancing. Employer will have to decide themselves if it's worth risk, as it's likely employees will be absent for 2+weeks for recovery.

Half in office, half out is the most expensive way to run office. Per head costs are doubled. If no one is in office space light and heat costs can be reduced greatly.

Every company will have to rethink their office strategy out of this. I can see a lot more IT work going across the world as a result and less reliance on local markets to fill positions. I can see a lot of IT based organisations bringing their office foot print way down.

Childcare, parent care. There's still a significant minority who have home care requirements and can't really leave home as a result.

High risk category. There's a significant minority who are recovering/recovered from cancer, cardiovascular problems and other conditions and diseases who should be cocooning right now.

Both of these groups might not be able to take unpaid leave and their employer can't afford to have them gone anyway. These will have to be accommodated via WFH.

Public transport risk. If these people are restricted from office, it will put pressure on private transport and car pooling.

Sending everyone home or calling everyone back is easiest option. Having a split is tough call and tricky to manage.

You do realize that just because work can be outsourced to save on costs, doesn't mean the work product is any good. It won't happen.

My old employer hired devs from India multiple times as they were cheap. He fired each dev he hired due to poor work product, and poor code.

We lost a big client because of all the bugs in the software. **** him anyway, he was a prick. But this "outsourcing" because it's cheaper will never happen to companies that people actually want to work for.

lawred2

rn wrote: »

Couple of points, most raised in other posts.

Having most people back increases the risk of a sick workforce, even with social distancing. Employer will have to decide themselves if it's worth risk, as it's likely employees will be absent for 2+weeks for recovery.

Half in office, half out is the most expensive way to run office. Per head costs are doubled. If no one is in office space light and heat costs can be reduced greatly.

Every company will have to rethink their office strategy out of this. I can see a lot more IT work going across the world as a result and less reliance on local markets to fill positions. I can see a lot of IT based organisations bringing their office foot print way down.

Childcare, parent care. There's still a significant minority who have home care requirements and can't really leave home as a result.

High risk category. There's a significant minority who are recovering/recovered from cancer, cardiovascular problems and other conditions and diseases who should be cocooning right now.

Both of these groups might not be able to take unpaid leave and their employer can't afford to have them gone anyway. These will have to be accommodated via WFH.

Public transport risk. If these people are restricted from office, it will put pressure on private transport and car pooling.

Sending everyone home or calling everyone back is easiest option. Having a split is tough call and tricky to manage.

already tried and already failed

ednwireland

ill go in as i have a lot of network works outstanding that i need to do (due to company merger)

but i have my own office

and ill be glad to get away from my home broadband wihich sturggles with most things

Cuddlesworth

antimatterx wrote: »

You do realize that just because work can be outsourced to save on costs, doesn't mean the work product is any good. It won't happen.

My old employer hired devs from India multiple times as they were cheap. He fired each dev he hired due to poor work product, and poor code.

We lost a big client because of all the bugs in the software. **** him anyway, he was a prick. But this "outsourcing" because it's cheaper will never happen to companies that people actually want to work for.

He just hired crap indian Devs, it was probably because he was paying bottom of the barrel prices. You get what you pay for, even with outsourcing. And in larger companies they wouldn't hire a single person, they hire entire teams of them.

fits

I would hope that I will be able to work from home 2 days a week after this, but who knows. I can do a lot of my work at home, no need to be in every day.

is_that_so

Know of one person who has to go to work on May 5, some things cannot be done from home. Others have been told of plans or plans in development. Most people I know expect to be in work at some point over the month of May. I don't think anyone can assume that they will be allowed to WFH all the time indefinitely.

Mitch Connor

I do look forward to going back into the office and seeing colleagues again, but I reckon we will see far more working from home in future than we saw previously.

In my office there were a few people who WFH a day a week. I think in future we will see most poeple work from home for some days of the week.

thegills

The world as we know has changed and WFH is now a part of life. MNC's will sell of most of their office space and keep the bare minimum.

fits

fits wrote: »

I would hope that I will be able to work from home 2 days a week after this, but who knows. I can do a lot of my work at home, no need to be in every day.

Is that not a basic standard these days? I've worked for three big organisations over the last 6 years, and allowing working from home for a day or two a week has been standard policy in all of them

ChikiChiki

ChikiChiki wrote: »

........... Social distancing is not workable in an office environment ..........

Of course it is.

Del Griffith

I expect most work places will utilise working from home as much as possible.

If you are required in an office though and you refuse to work I also expect you'd be sacked, and rightly so.

daheff

Del Griffith wrote: »

I expect most work places will utilise working from home as much as possible.

If you are required in an office though and you refuse to work I also expect you'd be sacked, and rightly so.

I'd expect wfh to become more normalised after things settle down. Companies who always feared wfh wouldn't work are now seeing that it can work (and at short notice so not 100% as effective as it could be).

Hotdesking will be a thing of the future. Wfh a few days a week and then in the office every so often.

Might mean more people can move further down the country and not have to commute to Dublin.

Win win all round for society.

ChikiChiki

Augeo wrote: »

Of course it is.

When you push 2 mtrs each direction out from yourself that's a lot of space lost. Around 1 person that is on average 5 other desk spaces that are lost. Could be as much as 8 in tighter office environments.

When you think about shared facilities such as canteen space, toilets, printers, meeting rooms, lifts, door handles, they will need to be consistantly wiped down throughout the day.

Agile work environments are certainly gone. If people return to the office they will need to take responsibility for their own desk space.

The insurance liability risk is probably the biggest factor. There is a duty of care to staff and by extension their families.

Evd-Burner

I've been able to work from home 2 days a week for some time, exercised rarely as kids at home.

Never have I missed going into work so much, the routine of having a normal day! I'm finding it difficult knowing that it's likely to be the end of summer before my place allow us back into the office, even if the government relax restrictions before then.

manlad

ChikiChiki wrote: »

When you push 2 mtrs each direction out from yourself that's a lot of space lost. Around 1 person that is on average 5 other desk spaces that are lost. Could be as much as 8 in tighter office environments.

When you think about shared facilities such as canteen space, toilets, printers, meeting rooms, lifts, door handles, they will need to be consistantly wiped down throughout the day.

Agile work environments are certainly gone. If people return to the office they will need to take responsibility for their own desk space.

The insurance liability risk is probably the biggest factor. There is a duty of care to staff and by extension their families.

Agile workspaces will become more prominent globally. Companies are already in a rush to consolidate office space as they look to introduce long term working from home policies. Desks that remain in the office will be for agile work, hot desks, with clean desk policies and regular deep cleans. The office will become a place for team to collaborate on a sporadic basis or do work thats not possible virtually.

princereingold

Murphman88 wrote: »

I work for a multinational in Dublin. We can do our job fully from home as all in cloud. How do people think companies are going to reopen offices and what timeline? Until now my company had a funny attitude to any requests to wfh.' Presenteeism' was very much the rule.

My own feeling on this is that unless there is either a vaccine or therapeutic avaiible I will refuse a request to be present in the office. Will many people take this stance? I have elderly parents so feel as though I couldn't see them if I'm forced to sit in an open plan office during this crisis.

Vaccine ? i hope you are ready to be shot full of some concoction developed by Bill Gates and co.?

miezekatze

My employer has always had a funny attitude to working from home too so I think they will probably have us back in the office as soon as they are allowed. I really hope their attitude has changed a bit since. Technically it's no problem to do the work from home though, and we're all crammed into an office that's too small for so many people anyway. I refused to come in during paddy's day week and had to take annual leave, they wouldn't allow me to work from home, I don't think there'll be much you can do once it's deemed 'safe' and they want you back in. I hope the government will force companies to keep staff at home as long as possible, if they leave it up to the companies a lot of people will have to go back for no reason. I am worried about going back eventually, I have to take public transport and we sit really closely together in the office. Don't miss the office at all.

seamus

My company has been handling home working quite well. I had incidentally spent the second half of last year changing all of our systems and processes to facilitate it, even though I was told there was no appetite at the top level to encourage home working. :E

Now that it's been working pretty well, I don't think there'll be a rush to get people back into the office until there's a very general lifting of restrictions. I'm well set up at home for the time being, but I just don't have the room right now to facilitate it long-term. I expect once the kids go back to school, I'll be going back into the office.