Remote working - the future?

I don’t believe that for a second, all your colleagues and friends want to work from home ?

its a problem for lots of ‘real’ people I can assure you :)

Likewise. I start at 9 and finish at 5.30. I have a dedicated office room. My wife works full time and my kids are teenagers are largely self-sufficient. The improvement WFH has brought to my quality of life has been enormous, and yes, I do get more time with my family. That tends to happen when you get back over 3 hours per day. Any increase in electricity or gas bills as a result of WFH are well worth it. That's how WFH is for some people and many do not want to go back to working in an office, many don't mind either way, and some people can't wait to get back because they need the interaction, feel it will improve their employment prospects, or for whom WFH is a pain for a variety of different possible reasons. This is a subject where generalisations don't really work because each person's set of circumstances, personality, attitude and requirements of the job will be different.

I did miss going into the office for a while, but not anymore.

I save 2.5 hours commuting. And I save an hour just hanging around or walking at lunch time outside the office, because hanging around in the office at lunch time is not lunch when they know where you are if something comes up. And the 10 or 15 minutes that I usually arrive in early because the timing of the buses so as not to be late, is mine now too.

Conservatively I think I have 3 hours a day to myself that I dont have when going to the office.

In the mornings i do the school run. 15 mins. Its a pleasure actually.

Alas that is all coming to an end as we have been told we are going back to the office.

Still hoping against hope that we get at least a couple of days working from home.

Dont care in a few months anyway because im quitting, and after that will probably only ever work in a place with WFH again if its widespread enough.

What proportion want permanent off-site working?

TBH all the talk of 3 hour daily commutes strikes me as mad: Most of you should have been looking for better located jobs long, long ago.

Likewise you should have been looking for better jobs, because you seem to have never worked in a place that resembles a modern workplace that trusts and cares about the well being off staff.

(a) What makes you assume people haven't been doing just that?

(b) What makes you assume those jobs exist?

Did you ever get valuable information or build a valuable networking relationship from an impromptu chat over coffee or lunch or at the watercooler?

No but I am not in the office to chat and gossip.

If I need valuable information my manager or team will provide it.

You can talk online and you don't don't a water-cooler to talk to someone.

You can meet up with team members in a coffee shop on lunch or after work also.

More naive I think.

If your manager provides you with all the information you need, then count yourself lucky. Many people don't have this.

There will be people now who have purchased a house far away from the office and can be forced back, into commuting. That, or be at the mercy of employers who will never, ever give them another pay rise. We’ve all handed over too much of our lives to employers, and I really thought this government would take the opportunity of making working from home a realistic work term, but alas the coffee shops and sandwich joints need cash, not to mention the revenue from fuel when commuting, so, work life balance be damned. For those saying find a better/ equivalent job locally, yeh, if such a thing existed, there would be no commuters.

Fwiw, one of the companies I am working for is planning on expecting any one who wants to work at home to have a suitable desk, chair, private work area and fast, reliable broadband. The first hint that one of these isn't available, and the message will be "a suitable desk is available here, use it".

This is one of the big concerns for companies that are considering allowing blended/full remote working. During the pandemic a certain leeway has been allowed in terms of a suitable home work environment. But going forward it will be the responsibility of the employer to ensure that an employee who is working remotely has a safe and ergonomic facility to work in. This will be a nightmare for facility and IT departments!

I really feel for people who upped and moved far away from Dublin.

I know for a fact in my place of work they will be checking addresses and use it as a tool to negotiate lower salaries with new staff who live far away.

I also think you are right in that someone who is working from home will be susceptible to smaller increases in salary since the employer knows it will be harder for them to move to a competitor.

And it looks like a fair few people who left apartments in Dublin to move home to parents will now be paying up to 50% more in rent when they finally do get another apartment in Dublin.

Some employers might try to hardball in such negotiations. However, there is a legal obligation in H&S legislation for the employer to provide whatever equipment is necessary for a safe working environment. If a desk and decent chair is required to ensure that the employee isn't going to cripple themselves working with a kitchen chair at a kitchen table, the employer is obliged to provide this. There is a lot to gain for the employer here in reduced office accommodation costs, so they might be shooting themselves in the foot by playing hardball.

A single one-off speed test is fairly meaningless, and can be heavily influenced by other users in the house (as you said) and even other users on the road, if they are sharing services to some extent. You'd really need to see a trend over a few days to come to any useful conclusion.

Really bad because I'm not letting employers away without pushing their office accommodation costs onto their employees?