to ask to WFH partly?

[cherrybunx0]

hi all,

just want to get some opinions and how to word this to my manager! I am currently on maternity leave but looking to go back to work end of summer/early September. I work in an office that are currently all working from home during to COVID. it's all computer based and we used to have catch up meetings every 2 weeks but other than that there isnt really a need to be in physically in the office if you see what I mean.
I'm thinking of asking my manager if I when I go back if I could work part of the week from home as it would really help me with childcare.
so I guess my 2 questions are;

firstly, is it likely offices would even be back in august/September and even if restrictions are eased is there not a possibility that the way offices work could be changed to encourage people to work remotely where they can anyway?
and secondly, particularly if you are a manager yourself, would you have a problem with this? I'm not sure why working from home is frowned on a lot in some places, I guess it's because it's harder to keep an eye on everyone but in my place we all have certain work we do so it would be obvious if it wasnt getting done.

thanks!

How would it help with childcare? You’d still need care if you’re working, even from home

Who is going to be looking after your child while you’re working from home? I’m not sure you can do both at the same time. I think it’s different at the moment because of the absolute necessity for people to work at home where they can. I doubt things will be back to normal by September though.

It’s worth having a conversation with your manager. I’d come up with a plan for answering “will you be as productive as at the office if you’re also looking after your child?”

You can certainly ask, and make a good case for it. You’ll still need childcare for all the hours you’re working, but could save on the hours spent commuting (my commute is nearly 3 hours round a day, so working from home would save 3+ hours of childcare costs a day)

When you say it will help with childcare, if that's in the context that you'll be finished in time to pick up from nursery then that's useful, but if you think you can look after a small child whilst working from home then you are mistaken tbh.

I'm really fortunate that I have a lot of family who would be able to have dd and help out. my dad is going to have her for 2/3 days when I'm at the office and the other 2 days my nan has offered to come over but this is where working from home would really help - she has said it would only really be doable for her if I was able to pick her up and I could give her a break when I have my work breaks (again I'm very lucky, I have a morning one, a lunch and an afternoon one). the reason it would be easier for me to work from home on the days my nan could help would be obviously I could take dd back for those breaks and I wouldn't have to worry about then getting to work on time - office is in complete different direction to my nans house.

yeah I think initially I'll probably be working from home full time anyway due to all this - I am curious to see if we ever will return to working in the office like we used to anyway. we have offices all over the world - our headquarters is in New York so I guess it's also dependant on what's happening in other locations too

I would just wait and see how it looks a bit nearer the time. You may find everyone is still working from home anyway.

I am WFH couple days a week during 'normal' times and WFH full time now with a child in tow. You are fooling yourself if you think you can look after a child and do your work. If it wasn't for the special circumstances at the moment my manager would have had stern words with me about my performance as I am absolutely shit at my job at the moment. You need childcare or work flexible enough that you can fit part time hours around your child during the week. But no chance of working full time and looking after a child at the same time. If you have a long commute though, WFH will save you that.

Agreed that you can't look after a dc while working (I know a lot of us are during the current crisis, but I wouldn't expect this is be agreed in more normal times).

I’m a manager, in a company that are fairly anti working from home (I’m generally very supportive of this), and one of my direct reports has just asked me whether she can WFH two days a week when she returns from mat leave.

I’ve said yes to her instantly because she is hard working, great at her job, and I don’t think two days WFH will make a difference to how she can do her job. She’s worked for the company for a long time so knows who to go to with a problem, and has good working relationships with the external team.

I have however recently had to performance manage someone who came into the business on a 3 day a week WFH contract (agreed by my predecessor). She wasn’t getting what she needed to done, and she wasn’t making any effort with the wider team (and I think if you’re working from home one of the downsides is that you need to work a lot harder to build good internal relationships).

You can’t use your wfh days as childcare. It will never work. If you mean that it helps with childcare because you don’t have to run to nursery to make the pick up time then that’s understandable.

Look at Mother Pukka and Pregnant then Screwed who I believe have good resources to support making flexible working requests.

no I wasnt planning on doing both lol! she needs a lot of my time and attention of course even now I couldn't imagine trying to do both. I'm just hoping that theyll consider it - I've been there 8 years, never been in trouble for attendance or performance and have worked my way up to a senior position so fingers crossed!