Working From Home Megathread

Unbelievable that a company would think that IBEC are in charge of covid public health advise rather than the government. Sounds like they are making up excuses to ignore the rules. The government advise is crystal clear that work from home where possible must occur. Leo has said that this might change in September but there has been silence on this lately. With the focus on ensuring that schools and colleges can reopen in September, and with some big companies pushing back to October, logically the government should push this back to October too and simply say that they want to see how things go with schools and colleges in September and the see if offices are possible thereafter.

so now flying to meet your colleagues is a perk? i thought you werent paid to go to a social club?

I'm not, I get paid to do work, the company would pay for the trip, not me 😘

And again, I would have the choice to not go as well. It isn't mandatory.

What has it got to do with the benefits of it? I can work very well on my own, and with the tools we use to communicate within work.

Meeting my colleagues in a foreign location for a team building exercise once or twice a year sounds perfectly fine to me. It's not like I hate them or anything 🤣

I am sure you would get over it if it was in the Bahamas.

It's interesting how we are often told that the push to get back to the office is sold as a way to train younger workers, or because they are in cramped accommodation, or because they will miss the social side, yet both the survey feedback and the actual productivity stats are showing that many young people are very happy to WFH.

It's a bit self-serving of the people who want to come back. I was going to say "older people", but actually I think this is more of a digital divide than an age thing. Older people who are what you might call digital natives (e.g. well able to use tools like Slack and who can cope with the flood of information) are well able to WFH, but their less digitally literate colleagues are struggling badly. I'm not sure like some say that being seen in the office is going to make you more likely for promotion, I suspect that in some companies it will be very obvious that the group who are always in the office are not the group who are the future of the company.

The reality?

Have you got any kind of resources that show that WFH is not productive?

I have posted plenty in here about how much more productive it is and how much happier staff are. They way you are talking though, it just seems you are ignorant or jealous of those that can work from home or remotely pretty easy.

I assume you are a manager if you have access to survey results to see what Junior staff are saying and can monitor the performance of a vast number of junior staff.

If your staff think they are performing well and you are not working to improve performance or even giving them feedback then it says more about your managerial skills.

I would rather listen to studies where it is bring reported that performance is the same or in some cases productivity has gone up.

I would listen to those more than someone who is either a terrible manager or who is making up stories.

Do you genuinely believe that everyone that's working from home is at least as if not more productive than they were in the office?

I don't recall saying everyone is as productive I said in general its being reported.

The people who work hard in the office will work hard at home, the people who slack off in the office will do the same at home.

At the end of the day you are given deadlines and your productivity is based on hitting deadlines.

A good manager measures performance on productivity and doesnt care if you are doing it in the office or from home.

People slacking off at home and not reaching deadlines will be caught if they are not reaching deadlines.

What else does a good worker do?

Your manager assigns you tasks and deadlines and performance is measured on your ability to hit those deadlines.

If you are hitting them on time or before time you are a good worker, if not your not performing to the standard expected.

I couldn't care less about your alternative point of view. You are trying to paint remote work as some sort of hinderance on junior staff, based on what? What you see/have heard? Very scientific way to approach it there 🤣

So many reports have shown an increase on productivity and happiness from staff with remote work or at least having the option to have it.

If some don't like it, then grand, head off back to the office, enjoy the commute and chit chat, do what you wish.

Fact remains that the last year has shown WFH has so many benefits for staff and companies.

The narrative is correct though.

Surveys are showing that workers are more productive WFH. They show that workers would consider leaving a job if remote work was not at least offered, so they would go where there is flexibility.

The top 3 benefits of remote work are increased productivity, increased efficiency and increased morale.

It also gives workers more options on where to live, which can reduce living costs when you don't have to live and rent in a big city.

On a personal level, I am happier now with work than I have ever been thanks to remote and async work. My current place of work has a varied level of experience and we work hard on our tools and processes to make sure everyone is included and work is synced.

Management takes many forms, if someone is underperforming, what difference would and office or WFH really make? I agree on the accountability side, but if someone is underperforming and their manager is in charge of their results, is that not a failing on the manager?