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The world just changed
A vaccine is a year away, if ever.
Johnson is trying to turn back the clock to a time that no longer exists
In reality millions of office workers have been able to work from home for the last decade+
It's cleaner, greener, cheaper, happier, more efficient.
BUT it means lots of things are no longer viable: The Tube, Trains, HS2, (transport funding needs to be rethought) city pubs, bars & cafes, Pret... dead
Suits ? Just for weddings now.
No more London weighting on your salary !
End London & inner cities distorting property prices?
Free broadband for all & nationalised rail is the way to Level Up (TM) (Corbyn must be spinning in his political grave!)
You don't need a huge office now, everything can be scaled back, a PO box & a Zoom account, a server farm.
Millions of m² of office space ? That's new housing now, BUT it's guaranteed slum housing, no playgrounds, no sound insulation- hefty amount of legislation needed to make sure it's converted to liveable spaces.
It's a huge upheaval, but it's simply never going to go back to how it was.
The government shouldn't be trying to nudge us back onto unsafe transport into unsafe offices.
They need to get on top of it now, preparing to support the cafes & pubs that may never reopen & the staff who are about to be let go, get them in training for something else now.
And the WFH millions- they still need to socialise & buy lunch, snack wagons in the suburbs? More cafes in local highs streets ?
We've got a genuis big data crunching superforecaster telling the PM what to do, he should've predicted this (according to his blog anyway) & be pointing that super brain of his at this.
The office is dead, we ALL need to get our head round that & the government needs to be ahead of it.
Several people in the office hate working from home.
Difficult marriage. Teenagers being teenagers. House just not big enough or quiet enough or just gets too hot.
And it introduces some interesting challenges if you have to do any kind of management.
Yeah Mrs Weeksy prefers the office, i'd happily WFH forever.. It would also potentially change where we live as our house is close to work, because, well, i have to get to work.
If we're never going back i can see me moving somewhere nearer some trails... Or maybe even Burgundy sooner than we ever thought.
Everyone WFH has made my commute to work much more pleasant. Every day that people start returning to work makes it that little bit worse. Please stay at home
As long as your dedicated, middle-class SOHO "space" is all feng shui, I'm sure it's topping.
I grew to hate working from home.
I want a demarcation between "work" and "home" - imagine if you job is really ****. It's now invaded your home - there is no respite.
Glorious, no doubt as they are, I think you're assuming your circumstances are ubiquitous.
it’s simply never going to go back to how it was.
I think things will return to normal eventually. Corporates won't want to be forced to sell real estate at below market rate prices.
I want a demarcation between “work” and “home” – imagine if you job is really ****. It’s now invaded your home – there is no respite.
MAybe for you.... maybe for some... not for all.
Please stay at home
This
Corporates won’t want to be forced to sell real estate at below market rate prices.
No, and a lot of pension fund money etc is invested in this type of property, another hit waiting to happen.
lol i see the prophets of doom are up early today 🙂
Yes and no. As ever, the solution lies in between the old and your new extremes.
And only applies to people working in offices. Anyone involved in actual production, research, practical physical roles can't work from home.
The main issue is space to work at home. MrsMC and I both need privacy when working from home. So we'd need two separate offices/secure work spaces.
Plus some people work better around/with others. How do you properly train someone to do a new role remotely? Not going well for our new starters, to be honest.
The solution is to be in the office maybe 2 days a week. We could rotate working in one space at home then.
Yes, transport, retail, cafe culture, gyms etc will need to adapt. More continental evening culture than daytime office culture. Needs a lot of planning and support for society to make that switch, but it would be worth it.
It'll be 90% back to how it was by October.
All the life changing things we did when movement was limited (we were never in lock down) will revert to as it was because "as it was" was easier.
Once schools go back and summer holiday season is over there will be overwhelming pressure which will override the covid potential. By November the only reminder will be a death toll deep in the news and the odd ball on public transport still wearing a mask.
You'll never get 100% of staff WFH, due to working conditions (no separate office away from the screaming kids/partner/dogs), poor internet (not everyone has 100 down/20 up - there's a lot of people out there with 5 down/1up), or just people who can't be as productive WFH, or need micromanagement.
So, offices will still be needed - maybe smaller and in cheaper locations, but still needed.
I do think there'll be a big change for a lot of companies (mine included - a floor of 200+ people and only 3 or 4 required to be in the office, and probably 90% WFH over 1600 staff) but most companies will still have an office presence.
Glorious, no doubt as they are, I think your assuming your circumstances are ubiquitous.
Ive done more than one zoom meeting hiding in a wardrobe so my kids dont find me, had to cut the video so my half naked 3 year old daughter doesnt crash it, Ive had to work through to midnight a lot because homeschooling has been a nightmare of arguing with kids/wife all day
Its not all perfect by any means,
But the world has changed, my point is the government/we need to accept that & adapt, encourage local wifi cafe spaces etc?
The office won't die, but companies will reduce their estate.
We'd planned 18 months ago to go from five buildings at our HQ down to three - with a lot of that being meeting areas, customer demo and presentation suites. In my role I was in the office a couple of days each week and I don't think that will change much but with more of our customers being comfortable with video calls we'll almost certainly reduce the number of times we see them in person. I've heard that my customers are looking to reduce their offices too - these are companies with ~20,000 people.
Some interesting thoughts from Kimbers on how more home working and less office working will change the UK. Suits and ties as work wear will slowly die, they've been on their way out for years. I've not worn a tie for four years, or a suit for at least two.
Shared space/co-working areas will grow too - a lot of start-ups have said they'll move away from expensive offices to home working/shared meeting suites.
Local cafes in housing areas will be a growth area, especially if they are OK to work in. Places catering to office areas and business parks will suffer. I'd love a local cafe I could walk to in 5-10 minutes for a break from being at home and some human contact!
Clearly not.
* most don't have a suitable space to work in at home.
* many don't have a suitable environment at home.
* many don't have the right IT.
* many need the social interaction work offers.
* many need the separation of work and home.
* many don't have fast enough or stable enough broadband.
* management is not easy.
* team dynamics are difficult.
* a Teams meeting is not the same as being around a table for a true working meeting.
* management by email is not an acceptable alternative to face to face interaction with your boss.
Yes clearly more people than expected can work from home and I think it will now be more accepted on an ad hoc or rota basis, becoming the norm, I don't think so.
I am working from home and really find it difficult to cope with being in one room for work and relaxation. My partner has always done some of her work from home and has the home office. I am working in the corner of the lounge. The other end of the lounge has a hearing aid test system which I am using to write online practicals for next semester. I miss the people I work with. I miss the students and I miss commuting on my bike.
Please let me return to work!
It’ll be 90% back to how it was by October.
This, sadly.
I was talking to the owner of the local chinese takeaway on friday , he has lost a lot of trade supplying office lunches & is now looking at having to deliver same lunch to the same company on a big wfh zoom meeting, obviously this is a huge logistical challenge for him
Hmmm, realistically I can only do a proportion of my job from home, maybe 25%. But what it has meant is greater flexibility over core hours, I've been able to offset my day and spend mornings with the kids, which is nice for me and them and gives my missus more space/time...
imagine if you job is really ****. It’s now invaded your home – there is no respite.
Sadly this is the case for the SO, she isn't very good at compartmentalising so 'work stress' created by what seems like poor management and a bad culture is intruding on home...
It’ll be 90% back to how it was by October.
Then 100% back to how it is now by the end of November...
One of our customers has a household of 7 people. 6 are working from home.
They are barristers .
She can’t do a bit of tidying or make any kind of noise. Very much a prisoner in her own home.
Office spaces will become cheaper and that will tempt many people back to communal work places.
That and wives/ mothers who are going absolutely ballistically mental.
Well bearing in mind nearly the whole of our semester 1 is online, I certainly won’t be returning to the office till Feb at the earliest. I agree that some middle ground will be found - if nothing else, the argument at many Unis for individual academic staff offices is rapidly going out the window...
Some people do like to find problems. Of course a lot people's homes aren't suitable, but that is because one of the main driving factors in choosing their home would be proximity to work and a reasonable commute. Take that out and add in a suitable home working space to your check list when buying a home and suddenly you can live somewhere much nicer. If you need separation then a garden office will do that pretty well. And surely with the extra free time from not commuting you can find a bit of time to socialise with people closer to home.
We have largely been able to do all our work from home without that much problem. I have started to struggle now mentally, living by myself, having virtually no face to face social interactions for the past few months (even regular social video chats isn't anywhere near the same). It has been compounded with a knee injury which means at the same time my exercise has been limited.
We also have an established team who know each other well, we now have someone new joining us, and god knows how we will manage that while working offsite.
Personally I am looking forward to getting back into the office just for some normal everyday social interaction. And before this I always felt a bit of an antisocial lone wolf, quite happy to be on the periphery of any social event, love taking a tent into the middle of nowhere for a week or two and rarely meeting anyone else. I certainly don't want or need to be constantly chatting and be the centre of attention, but I have learned that I do need to be around other people, I have very much not enjoyed this level of solitude for so long.
(even regular social video chats isn’t anywhere near the same)
Why not ?
I know someone who is co-managing 3 big projects in Cardiff, 2 of them are massive office blocks being built in the city centre. His clients are absolutely shitting themselves that they won't be able to fill them when completed as they've been designed to work with most staff coming in on public transport (very little car parking on site) and to be full of office drones with the ground floor full of sandwich and coffee shops. They're massively exposed to those projects collapsing as they are due to raise the 3rd round of funding in the next few weeks. The other one is a student block nearby and even that is under review due to the drop in foreign student applications.
I hope that companies look at the whole WFH thing objectively, even just giving people who can the option of 2/3/4 days a week to do so would massively help cut pollution, congestion and wasted time and money benefiting everyone.
The Gov dept I’m currently contracting at are looking at a WFH first model. The existing office estate will be designed for more collaborative spaces rather than banks of desks. Folk may visit an office once a week or less as required. At the same time, there will be reserved spaces for those who don’t want to or can’t practically WFH. There’s going to be a lot more personal discretion. Some of the less able middle managers are going to really struggle with giving up command and control.
It’s great, as a contractor, where there’s chaos, there’s cash!
I hated working from home and returned to the office as soon as I could. Luckily the office is only a couple of miles away. I live in a small, open plan house with two young kids. I also like work and life to be separate. It was never going to work for me. If I could afford to move to a bigger house (which we need to do but can’t) and had a job I enjoyed perhaps it would be different.
I should imagine I’m not alone in my situation.
Some people do like to find problems. Of course a lot people’s homes aren’t suitable, but that is because one of the main driving factors in choosing their home would be proximity to work and a reasonable commute. Take that out and add in a suitable home working space to your check list when buying a home and suddenly you can live somewhere much nicer. If you need separation then a garden office will do that pretty well. And surely with the extra free time from not commuting you can find a bit of time to socialise with people closer to home.
Sorry but that's a bit of a "let them eat cake" attitude. People don't just "choose" houses or jobs to suit their lifestyle and/or location or just bung on an upgrade to allow WFH. Budgets aren't infinite and many circumstances are forced upon people.
This last 4 months has not been universally positive, it's really only suited the middleclass office commuters (of which I am one), who aren't actually the centre of the universe...
Some people do like to find problems. Of course a lot people’s homes aren’t suitable, but that is because one of the main driving factors in choosing their home would be proximity to work and a reasonable commute. Take that out and add in a suitable home working space to your check list when buying a home and suddenly you can live somewhere much nicer.
Must be lovely in your world. We bought our house on the grounds of it was one we could afford. That was the sole criteria. This place is brilliant at times and then I forget it is basically a middle class bubble of sorts. Bless you, thinking everybody has a check list when buying a home.
Interesting article in the WSJ
Must be lovely in your world. We bought our house on the grounds of it was one we could afford. That was the sole criteria.
Is that really true though? You didn't consider location at all? It was literally the only house you could afford and there wasn't another cheaper house on the market anywhere else. I'm a little sceptical.
* a Teams meeting is not the same as being around a table for a true working meeting.
Quite right. A Teams meeting wastes far far less time.
I was talking to the owner of the local chinese takeaway on friday , he has lost a lot of trade supplying office lunches
There was a thing in the paper suggesting that footfall in town centres is back up to about 80% of normal, but the city centre remain way down, presumably as so many office workers are WFH.
Some people do like to find problems. Of course a lot people’s homes aren’t suitable, but that is because one of the main driving factors in choosing their home would be proximity to work and a reasonable commute. Take that out and add in a suitable home working space to your check list when buying a home and suddenly you can live somewhere much nicer. If you need separation then a garden office will do that pretty well. And surely with the extra free time from not commuting you can find a bit of time to socialise with people closer to home.
Most aren't just going to move house now they can work from home though, and those that do it'll be a long term thing. Plus you still have to consider if you move jobs from one with 100% WFH, will you be able to find something else with the same? If you've suddenly upped sticks to move to the highlands, you'll be buggered if you can only find jobs that require 3 days week in the London office.
Long term, the change to a greater number of people WFH, and incorporating that into a house (separate office room, converted garden shed etc) will happen, but as above, it won't be everyone.
It’s not all work from home for big companies, here in Ireland Amazon announced a new 170,000 square foot office campus in Dublin and the big multinational next to my work is looking for more office space to allow for social distancing of the 600 strong work force. Not all doom and gloom.
Is that really true though? You didn’t consider location at all? It was literally the only house you could afford and there wasn’t another cheaper house on the market anywhere else. I’m a little sceptical.
Be as sceptical as you like! It was the only house within our budget that we liked and could afford, that’s it. I grew up on a rather rough estate and that would’ve been the only cheaper option. Something I wasn’t keen to go back to.
Most aren’t just going to move house now they can work from home though, and those that do it’ll be a long term thing.
Absolutely. It will be a slow, long term change if it happens. Hopefully this forced recent change will help show people what can be done and give them a steer when making future decisions. We need to get away from all the commuting that normally happens. Its a massive waste of time and a blow to the environment. As I said, people like to look for the problems, find reasons why it can't be done. It'll be an effort and it's not simple but change for the better is possible.
Corporates won’t want to be forced to sell real estate at below market rate prices.
Most just rent, owning property is very 1980s.
No, and a lot of pension fund money etc is invested in this type of property, another hit waiting to happen.
Pension funds are very diversified, so a knock to commerical property prices won't be the end of the world.
This last 4 months has not been universally positive, it’s really only suited the middleclass office commuters (of which I am one), who aren’t actually the centre of the universe…
On the radio this morning was a news article about happiness during lockdown, went down initially, then back up....
There are so many elements to this, there's no sweeping statement to cover it... I know people who have always worked from home anyway - but they do have an office base to do meetings and suchlike.
My own job, sort of govt. based, I can see us not having to go in much - we do have part of our job role which can only be done on-site, which I originally thought would keep up us permanently office based, but turns out 1 person can cover it a few hours a day.
I've had to temporarily set up an office space in my front room.. got me thinking I really should get a more permananent arragement organised.
It will all be back to normal work by the end of the year. Unless your in a multinational / london centric company.
My wife and I work for the same company, she was 4/5 WFH at the start and is back to 1/5 WFH, mad thing is that my managers were WFH but the rest of us are on shift, makes management very hard, its not sustainable.
I'd say there will still be a degree of WFH but it wont be permanent.
It has the potential to make a huge difference but as has been stated it's not 100% of people 100% of the time. But even if it's 25% o 50% of the time it'd make big changes to rush hours
and pressure on green belt possible. Wheree I work we make things so the on site team need to be on site. I've been able to do stuff off site using the on site team as my eyes and ears up until now. But we've got some big on site goings on coming up that needs (not me specifically obvs) my knowledge and hands on abilities. The only problem is, because we've coped so far, I can't convince management to let me back on site! 🤪
Also, moving house to get a home office is just bollocks people live where they live for a huge range of reasons, families, schools, community, culture, compromise for the SOs work....etc etc.
So buying a bigger house suitable for working from home further from an office and/or in a nicer area is a realistic solution?
I can tell you that estate agents in nice rural areas within a couple of hours of London by train - and that's up here into Derbyshire - are getting a lot of enquiries from people wanting to know what their 1 bed flat in Bermondsey will buy them up here now they can work from home and pop into the office once a week. Social distancing in Bakewell the other week was fine except outside estate agents windows where tourists seemed to be climbing over each other.
Which is a bit of a bugger for any locals doing those low paid key worker roles that kept us going during the pandemic.
I'm fine with this societal shift in theory, but you need to correct 40 years of failure to provide adequate social housing for the 25-35% of people who, realistically, need to rely on it.
I'm lucky as in theory I have an almost perfect set-up to work from home:
I have a dedicated home office in the spare room which means I can switch off from work by not going in there when not working.
I have a fast internet connection.
I have no kids and a wife who works for the NHS so has to go to work and therefore leaves me in a quiet house.
I can, and do, work very, very efficiently as I have no distractions.
I'm 10 mins from the local town centre to get a coffee or sarny if I so desire.
But.
I can't wait to get back to the office.
I want to see my colleagues in person, to chat and exchange ideas.
I want to meet customers and shake some hands.
Whilst I can work efficiently at home, when I have an off day I struggle to get anything done at all, in the office I'd have people around me to help me get it done.
So whilst, in theory at least, work from home can be just as good if not better than being in the office, in practise, if I can get back in 3 days a week I'll be overjoyed.
I’ve been WFH for a long time now (over a decade) and it’s very boring. I don’t even get zoom style interaction so end up talking to the dogs a lot. They are not natural conversationalists.
Interesting confirmation that STW is something of a wee bubble.
I want to see my colleagues in person, to chat and exchange ideas.
I want to meet customers and shake some hands.
Whilst I can work efficiently at home, when I have an off day I struggle to get anything done at all, in the office I’d have people around me to help me get it done.
Very much this.
I used to laugh at our home workers who would come into the office for the monthly team meeting and literally never stop talking the whole day, because they were so starved of normal face to face interaction. Now I completely get it!
God the OP is absolute rubbish sorry to say. All the "benefits" of working from home mainly fall with the employer its "cheaper" for them but more expensive for us in every aspect general utilities, food and all that get pushed onto the worker. I feel like the majority claiming the office is dead are those lucky enough to have a home office. Come back to me when you have spent 4 months sat on a sofa working from home like I have. Also, lets not forget the mental health benefits if sitting and working with you team in the same building talking face to face to solve problems.
And, a final thought im about to move house so will have no internet for a few weeks with no offices that makes stuff really hard.
I'd like to think the expectation from companies won't be that WFH is a must unless they plan on compensating folk for the extra floorspace and things like a proper office chair doing it right long term will take. Also heating when we hit the winter proper - we got lucky with a very warm start to lockdown given the time of year. People's bills will go up lots if the house is normally unoccupied during the working day. The concept of HAVING to WFH longterm for many would be a nightmare for mental health, physical space, lack of good internet etc etc.
But - reducing all the commuting every day for everyone - hell yes! It seems a win win socially, economically, environmentally.
Very interesting R4 programme last week about the difference between a zoom and a physical meeting - we subconsciously start to breath in sync and the mirrored body language that does not happen remotely. Apparently explains a lot of the cutting across each other you get in a zoom/teams meeting. Also, I've hated being managed and managing others exclusively online. I know this is partly about a change of working pattern but I just don't think it cuts it.
For me a nirvana would be a world where you had a physical place to work that you had to be for a certain amount of the week so that physical meetings could happen and you could be if you chose for the rest of the week but with WFH much more of a thing. So say you ended up in the office 2 days a week and WFH the rest. Lots of boring things need to happen however like train season tickets for part time use making economic sense which they don't at the moment. It would also be good if somehow it was coordinated so the whole world did not commute in on a Monday with everyone WFH on a Thursday - that would be hell for commuting and financial ruin for the services that survive off the back of office workers.
no shit 😂 the assumption that everyone has enough land & the funds to build a separate garden office is especially hilarious 😃Interesting confirmation that STW is something of a wee bubble.
would be a world where you had a physical place to work that you had to be for a certain amount of the week so that physical meetings could happen and you could be if you chose for the rest of the week but with WFH much more of a thing.
This is how our work are advertising things as the potential new normal - a rented office with a 100% bookable hot desk/rooms. Employees will be encouraged to "mix it up" on thier own terms, and some teams like ours will have regular once a months meetings, COVID cautious.
I don't buy into the costs being passed onto the staff argument. You can get an allowance/small tax rebate for heating, I'm saving £80 - £100 a week in fuel, parking, "posh" coffees, ad-hoc lunches and post work beers, collections for retirements, weddings, births, deaths....
If you're expected to work from home your employer should be making sure that you have a suitable desk, chair etc
I’m saving £80 – £100 a week in fuel, parking, “posh”
Conversely those that arguably did the right thing and plonked their home and work close enough that they could walk or bike to work don't have this self induced 'tax' benefit.
collections for retirements, weddings, births, deaths….
Hmmmm, I think that might say something about you. Does this mean that now you are out of sight, out of mind you can get away without being a team player? I think if working from home is a long term sustainable thing teams needs to remain being teams. And if that means buying each other gifts, making a team member feel valued on a special day or having some social time with them over a drink it should very much still continue. If you don't value these things....well...you suck as a work colleague!
If you’re expected to work from home your employer should be making sure that you have a suitable desk, chair etc
Will they also be paying for the extension for those not fortunate to have the space to accommodate said desk and chair too?
If you're not travelling to work or getting dressed or paying for lunch or pens you won't be needing to be paid so much, will you?
Space is a massive issue that seems to have been missed by a lot of managers. My wife and I regularly get messages from work about how things are going but they always seem to assume you have a actual space to work in separate from your normal life. They don;t seem to realise people are sitting on their sofa or dining table then have to pack their office away every night and set it up again in the morning.
I sit at the dining table and my wife sits at a camping table behind me. We don't have a spare room to work in, so before summer holidays started our 2 kids were working in their bedrooms. This is all massively intrusive to our lives.
We're having an attic conversion started in Oct so we will have a spare room once thats done which will make things much better, especially if the kids actually get to go back to school in Sept!
We'll be one of the lucky ones then though, and there will still be loads of people that just don't have proper spaces to work in.
All that should be considered before we right off offices completely as well as the social/mental side of being with colleagues, idea building or training juniors. It's nice just to be able to just lift your head and speak to some one or as k a general question about the scheme your working rather than having to book in a teams call....
I don't think office working will go back to 100% for all, I'd like to carry on wfh a few days a week, but it will certainly not disappear all together and nor should it.
If you’re expected to work from home your employer should be making sure that you have a suitable desk, chair etc
That is assuming someone has space to put a desk and chair in their house? My personal situation there just isnt space in my 1 bed flat. I feel like a lot of people who champion wfh are lucky enough to be in a position where they have a decent office set up and seem unable to understand why its not the same for everyone.
Also, people seem to forget that some people like myself enjoy the office. I like cycling to work, seeing my friends (yep i like the people i work with) and being able to switch off once 5:30 hits leaving my laptop at work.
I think there's going to be a big increase in demand for local building firms doing extensions/garage conversions/posh sheds for home offices. I worked from home occasionally before, and have moved into the spare bedroom for now (its not like we have any guests), but the view from my employer is that we're likely (long term) to never be back permanently in the office as we used to be. Maybe we'll be in 1 day a week, or 1 week a month. For that level of permanency working from home, I (along with lots of others) will spend to get a permanent, nice space to spend 8 hours a day..
If you don’t value these things….well…you suck as a work colleague
I don't agree. There's no obligation to pay for other work colleagues gifts. That's the kind of thing I do for my friends, notwithstanding one may also be the other but not in everybody's case.
All the “benefits” of working from home mainly fall with the employer its “cheaper” for them but more expensive for us in every aspect general utilities, food and all that get pushed onto the worker. I feel like the majority claiming the office is dead are those lucky enough to have a home office. Come back to me when you have spent 4 months sat on a sofa working from home like I have. Also, lets not forget the mental health benefits if sitting and working with you team in the same building talking face to face to solve problems.
The OP actually has spent the last 4 months trying to WFH on the sofa , while we try & home school 4 kids!
Trying to use the laptop while 3 year olds want to mash on the keyboard is hell.
Our house is a state,
I actually work in a lab so 70-50% of my work has to be done on site (& this last 3weeks I'm now doing 2.5 days a week back in the lab, but odd shifts to keep numbers down)
It's been a testing time especially as haven't been able to have grandparents help out!
I definitely miss genuine interaction, tho my boss has been pretty good, we have a daily optional 10am zoom chat , weekly group meetings & bi weekly department ones after our weey meeting we 'go to the pub' have a beer & do a quiz.
My productivity went in fits & starts
But I'm not wasting 2 hrs a day & £500 a month commuting
Even if i dearly miss interacting physicallu with colleagues
Once youngest two were back in nursery it got a lot easier.
My point is that with at least for a year, this will be the norm & assuming one day we have a vaccine/treatment
The internet rendered many aspects of offices a decade ago, zoom , teams, slack, WhatsApp
We still need to interact & meet up, maybe a few days a month etc
About Half the UK workforce are office based, we've shaped our towns & cities around it , but in the age of the www it's not efficient.
Government, managers, businesses, workers have had to change since lockdown
We all need to adapt some more
If you’re not travelling to work or getting dressed or paying for lunch or pens you won’t be needing to be paid so much, will you?
I think you're taking the piss, but...
What about people who didn't pay to travel to work previously?
You still pay for lunch, you just don't buy a pre packed butty every day.
I haven to buy more pens now as I can access the stationary cupboard.
In winter I'll have the heating on longer. I might need to upgrade my Wifi, I'm using more electricity at home now.....
If I didn't have a seperate room with a door I can close, and a pc set up on a big desk with a comfy chair and multiple screens there's no way I'd have been able to WFH at the same level as I am, I feel for the people having to sit on the sofa and work, it's not a long term solution.
We as a company are now in the process of sending out hundreds of extra monitors/chairs etc etc to users as WFH is being implemented longer term, which will help - but none of that helps if you're in the same room as a screaming kid watching paw patrol and a dog barking and needing attention.
Ideally everyone would have a space which is off limits to other people - "if the doors closed, we don't disturb daddy, OK?" - apart from bringing the odd cup of coffee of course 😀
There is always going to be a cadre of people who think that any interaction with colleagues aside from strict business that assists them to achieve their explicit objectives is a "waste of time".
Everybody has different approaches and needs, and home situations. In my view we will have to accept each other's ways of working a bit more in terms of being in the office vs WFH.
It is very difficult to build a collaborative approach to working, especially with new people joining.
I can't see us being in the office again until after winter. Why pay all that money to heat a huge building, 'flu season, lots of reasons.
The figure of 20% had come up - I read that as we all attend the office on the same day once a week to speak to each other - different branches on different days. Some kind of booking system, come in if you want/need on the other days, don't if you don't.
How long before ikea start selling WFH office pods ?
I don’t agree. There’s no obligation to pay for other work colleagues gifts. That’s the kind of thing I do for my friends, notwithstanding one may also be the other but not in everybody’s case.
Not being funny chap, but from your previous posting history I would have expected you to say that. Whilst huge whole office contributions where people are expected to chip in for someone they would struggle to recognise are naff, gifts and cards for those you work closest with are a good thing imo. More than the gift itself it's the fact that you value them as a person that is important. I can't imagine wanting to work in a team full of people who didn't want to be at least a small part of each other's lives (enough to acknowledge their marriage or eat a cake with them on their birthday) . But I'm writing this on an internet forum notorious for being populated by the socially awkward so I'm not expecting wholehearted support!
I think you’re taking the piss, but…
What about people who didn’t pay to travel to work previously?
You still pay for lunch, you just don’t buy a pre packed butty every day.
I haven to buy more pens now as I can access the stationary cupboard.
In winter I’ll have the heating on longer. I might need to upgrade my Wifi, I’m using more electricity at home now…..
You can claim tax relief for stuff, but is it worth it?
https://www.gov.uk/tax-relief-for-employees/working-at-home
A whole £26 a month. Wooooo
It’ll be 90% back to how it was by October.
Deaths only doubling every three days then?
We won’t be back in an office until 2021. And even then we have 11/9 hot desks. More than three days at home requires a new contract for us.
Wait till the tube and trains fill up. Currently at 25% capacity.
Our workplace is a mix - some people can't wait to get back, others wouldn't mind if they never saw an office again! I suspect that breakdown is split pretty evenly between the people with lack of space / crap internet / limited facilities nearby and those with massive houses / spare rooms / no kids.
You miss those little moments of social interaction; the quick coffee break, the sitting down with lunch or a walk to the cafe / sandwich shop and those moments before / after meetings where you can have a brief chat with one or two colleagues.
But time is more productive, meetings are generally better attended online than in person because of the lack of travel and you can fit more into the day. Was always a logistical nightmare of planning a meeting in the Leeds office and then the travel arrangements (and basically wasted time) back to Manchester or off to another meeting in Sheffield/York etc.
And of course there are plenty of people who can't work from home or would still need to go into work a couple of days a week. Hopefully it will make the overall commute a bit better with staggered working hours, fewer people travelling per day but it could easily take a couple of years for it all to filter through the system as workplaces and employees adapt, companies consolidate offices and so on.
the consensus is: it depends and everyone's different.
in my own case I currently WFH 2 days a week only as still on flexible furlough when (if?) Im back to 5 days then a happy medium of 2 days in and 3 days WFH would be sweet.
in my area where WFH is entirely possible, subject to the IT and remote access being secure and fast enough, then it really helps with employment prospects as I can now consider commuting to the next big city if its only 2 days a weeks, whereas 5 days would've been a tortuous grind.
sorry for being a curmudgeon but sat at my home office (dining table currently) and listening to 6 music all day instead of weak office 'bantz' is far more appealing
but these are my particulars I understand how WFH is driving people nuts. even things like - having to pick up my kid from school and avoid after school club fees (which means I have to catch up in the evening and blurring work/home lines) or being expected to do housework. these all suck
I'm lucky I can either work from the conservatory or summer house - we've got the space. MrsF was working, but on furlough, and no job shortly, she had a desk in the house. My son was working from his bedroom, but has been let go - found it very hard as he was a trainee and had little support.
Lots of my colleagues are working from their rooms or on a settee - can't be good, also add in the stress of young kids. My kids are older teens.
I'm looking forward to some more flexibility, and wouldn't mind working from home 2-3 days a week, and I'll do 'earlies' when back in the office, but I'm missing the interaction, office banter and general buzz. It can be very lonely sat in a shed at the end of the garden.
We have staff that don't have a work laptop that are struggling with their own PC/laptops as they aren't allowed the VPN software that all the laptop users have. Some staff managed to take their office computer home. I can see rolling out of laptops being the norm. The VPN has worked perfectly, and my wifi/internet has been great. Some staff have struggled.
Corporates won’t want to be forced to sell real estate at below market rate prices.
Most just rent, owning property is very 1980s.
No, and a lot of pension fund money etc is invested in this type of property, another hit waiting to happen.
Pension funds are very diversified, so a knock to commerical property prices won’t be the end of the world.
I have had two depressing letters about suspension of trading in my pension funds because of the huge drop in their value. I strongly suspect that my (already meagre) pension savings will not recover in time for me to retire.
My sister works for a large company with very expensive central London offices. They've all been workign from home from 3 weeks before lockdown.
They've just polled all staff to see who wants to return to the office and who would be happy to continue working from home. The percentage was 20% who wanted to return to the office.
These were exclusively recent graduates and staff in their 20's as they were all living in either houseshares or tiny flats as obviously thats all they can afford in London
WFH has its advatanges.
Me, earlier.
I have had two depressing letters about suspension of trading in my pension funds because of the huge drop in their values
Unless you've stuck all your pension in property funds, this should only affect a small part of your pension.
My Clerical Medical company pension's default allocation used to be 20% in commercial property.
NB I pulled out of commerical property some time ago, so have propbably less than 1% of my pension in property.
They’ve just polled all staff to see who wants to return to the office and who would be happy to continue working from home. The percentage was 20% who wanted to return to the office.
We did this and the response was also very low, so we decided not to renew our lease and are now officeless!
Not being funny chap, but from your previous posting history I would have expected you to say that. Whilst huge whole office contributions where people are expected to chip in for someone they would struggle to recognise are naff, gifts and cards for those you work closest with are a good thing imo. More than the gift itself it’s the fact that you value them as a person that is important. I can’t imagine wanting to work in a team full of people who didn’t want to be at least a small part of each other’s lives (enough to acknowledge their marriage or eat a cake with them on their birthday) . But I’m writing this on an internet forum notorious for being populated by the socially awkward so I’m not expecting wholehearted support!
I understand you. Just from a physiological perspective though I'm intrigued as to why you think that. Do you think I don't have friends?
FWIW, I'm on the Reset program where my money and outgoings are prioritised toward the support of my family and future rather than a Secret Santa gift that ultimately most people don't want and goes in the bin. Thats not to say I don't ever contribute to charity or others - I prioritise it to when it has proper meaning and effect towards peoples feelings and lives rather than throw it at tat people won't remember.
You'll know from my history this is a tough balance but also a benefit of reduced materialism - I've no need to buy others admiration or adoration through throwaway gifts.
Anyway, lets not bore everyone.
We did this and the response was also very low, so we decided not to renew our lease and are now officeless!
Also happening to us. We are now getting WFH advisories (e.g. take breaks) advisories. and advice.
My company is downsizing it's office and we're a commercial property business. Love working from home. No need to be performatively busy, if i want to spend half an hour quietly thinking about a problem i can. No one asking me questions about mice (i'm a senior server tech), nice home cooked lunches, the list goes on.
I do have proper space for a desk though, appreciate not everyone does. Heard tales of youngsters in shared houses hunched over laptops on beds!
the only things i miss about the office are cycling in, and Caribbean curry wednesdays.