If you WFH, what's your Friday afternoon like?

How do they track you?

The lack of understanding screams out from every word of that post.

I wondered this too! No teacher I know has more than about 15 mins to eat lunch!

It's a catch up day and I tend to have an "easy" meeting with my senior team at 3pm. After that, we all log off or just keep an eye on things while handling personal stuff

I do more work if I’m at home on a Friday. If I am in the office we usually go out for lunch then crack into the beers around 4.30. If I’m at home I generally eat at my desk and wait until at least 6 for a wine!

If I have work to do I'll do it, if people put in meetings I'll attend but generally by lunchtime there are no meeting and after I've sorted my to do list most stuff can wait until Monday. I think a lot of office jobs are more about output than hours and if the work you need to do is done then no one really cares if you are working 8 hours a day. I'm in the office twice a week and even on those days if I feel I can leave an hour or so early because my work is done then I will, no point just sitting there for the sake of it. Work peaks and troughs through the week and some days are longer than others. Fridays at home seem generally accepted as more chill day even by senior leadership. Output over hours!

Started at 7.30 finished at 19.00. Ten minute break for a coffee and a pee. Same as every other day. We've twice as much work and half the number of people to do it as this time last year.

How on earth are you able to go to a cafe for lunch. do you work in the UK?!

I’m with you op. I have meetings mon to wed pm next week, 8:30pm, 7-10pm, 6-8pm and 8:30 - 9:30, so am thinking of finishing early the Friday. I won’t be pretending anything though, I’ll be quite transparent about it! There is no argument for getting people back into the office here, colleagues can see I’ve been actively working all these evenings and I bloody well wouldn’t do it if I had to go to the office every day.

I'm a teacher so don't work from home, but take Fridays easier in that I leave as soon as lessons are done (2.30pm). Monday-Thursday I leave sometime between 4 and 5. I love the Friday feeling!

I work to my best out put. Monday and Tuesday I could easily do 10+ hours. Friday we pretty much avoid meetings but I try to network, finish up outstanding issues and if I'm lucky prepare for my 9am team meeting on Monday. Then go to the Gym + swim.

@MrsWidgerysLodger sounds great! What job did you do.

Its so hard when looking at career changing to be able to see by the type of flexibility and atmosphere in the job.

I see "busy" and "fast paced" in ads and then think of threads like this and wonder if it's all relative.

Oh the places I have opened a laptop. On a kerb outside a pub. In the dentists waiting room. Restaurant tables obviously, that’s quite civilised. A field once as I had a day off and we went on a day trip to Sheppey

My hair dresser used to have a home salon so I'd walk to her house (2 mins) and do some work while the dye worked its magic. She bloody well moved and now I have to go to the actual salon at the w/e. It's more of a treat I suppose, but it worked so well before.

Can't currently work due to health issues but when I did we used to kick off Friday AM with a quick recap of the week then use the rest of the day if general admin catch up, tidying of those little loose ends, double checking next week's schedule etc. So not particularly arduous stuff but all work nonetheless.

There was an understanding at work that if you got everything done before the working day was finished then that was fine and you were good to "clock off" as it were while being paid for the full day on the proviso you were contactable to jump back in if shit hit the fan.

Fridays are no different to other days really. I suppose there's the anticipation of the w/e, but that comes with a feeling of "yay, it's the w/e" and "oh crap, I really wanted to get such a such done" and "I'd better write a list for next week".
In reality, at the moment it depends on what DS2 (15) is up to.
I'm a lone parent and live rurally and my flexible work means I can collect him from town (where his school is) if he's gone to the gym and then to friends or not. Today he didn't need collecting until 7.30pm so I worked until 6pm and then lay on the sofa playing Candy Crush trying not to fall asleep did jobs around the house.
Other days I'll collect him a bit earlier and go back to my desk.

I work in an international team and Friday afternoon tends to be the day people will sign off early if we've had early or late meetings during the week.

@Jeannie88 call centre
Our status is on a screen so lunch/break etc and you can see how long you've been in each status, if you're on a call or available
Rest time (toilet/drink) needs to be less than 10 mins per day
Calls come through automatically (incoming and outgoing) so you can't leave your desk

Yes I can MN/read if not on a call but can't leave my desk (time between calls is few and far between!)

Three times as productive as an officer-worker’s Friday afternoon, if WFH threads are to be believed.

Lol at the busy stressful job that involves a two hour admin clean up and ends at 4pm.

Why are you happy for everyone except admin to do this? Doesn’t seem very fair at all.

The same as every other afternoon. I've no idea why it would be any different.

Sorry, from MN it's never come across as this. How do employers check? I was just responding to the OP who felt that having to work hard for a couple of days felt entitled to taking the Friday off. She clearly doesn't represent or give justice to you and others who do. Xx

Of course, so many jobs have become wfh, but the response to OP was that she's fortunate to be able to have downtime on a Friday and choose to do so. That's the difference, people who don't have office jobs can't do this. You've had the experience of student jobs dealing with the public, so I'm sure you understand the other side to this?

'I wonder about people honestly' as well, those who don't get others who can't take downtime as they are physically present and active at work, not sat behind a screen at home, with all the advantages that come with it. So taking a Slack day isn't an option for many, hence the response to post.

Funny how the people telling remote workers to think about emergency services who can't work from home never apply the same principle to benefits the other way round. If you're eg a remote worker in the private sector, anyone working in the emergency services is likely to have much better pension, sick pay and maternity pay than you. But none of the finger waggers ever have anything to say about that.

Not a single thought no.

Today I was out on an interview panel so lots of sitting around.

Usually my Friday is a bit of mentoring for my trainees in the morning, reading and planning in the afternoon. I always finish at four, start early in the morning.

Many of the ones that can swan off for lunch with their husbands might be called at 7pm to firefight situation that can only be dealt with by them. And because they will be salaried, they won't get OT for that, because it's "business needs".

Sure some people take the piss. But some don't. Being jealous isn't going to change that. Personally I work hard for the flexibility my job gives me, so the times I'm late in I might have been system testing at 3am. But you wouldn't know that.