Are the days of WFH over?

[MerryMarigold]

Dh been working from home since Covid. Been 1 FtF meeting a week/ fortnight for past year.

Work have said everyone needs to be in work in central London for 3 days per week after Easter.

Not too bad for us, we live in the same place we lived before. Still a 1.5hr commute each way (plus associated costs). Not so good for others who live in the middle of nowhere.

Is this a trend or just his global company?

No of course not!

A blanket “work from home is over” is a daft statement, pre covid there were many people working remotely or hybrid.
Covid didn’t invent working from home, it just made it more common and more accessible.

Lots of “average” roles and companies may seek to go back to majority office but there are plenty of more niche or progressive companies who are absolutely fine with recruiting remotely. It completely depends on the company, role and business need.

I won’t ever go back to an office environment more than 1/2 times a week, luckily my company are hybrid and my type of role (BI / IT) can easily be done remotely - in fact remote work is preferable because working in development and data, you don’t want people waffling on in your ear all day. And what is the point in travelling to an office just to have to book out a room to concentrate away from the masses.

May I ask what job this is?

And what jobs do others do that facilitate WFH and it working well? Really interested to know 😁

I totally agree, I get loads more done, work really hard. I also work way over my paid hours which I couldn’t do if I was going into the office

I've WFH for years. I work on projects all over the world and have only rarely needed to travel to them. There's no way I'll be going into an office again.

Nope.

I work from home most of the time. I have a long term health condition and home-working means I can continue to work.

I think the idea that you need to be in an office and chained to your desk to do a good job is ludicrous.

It also is a system that privileges, was created by and is aimed at a specific type of employee: mainly youngish, able men.

Because anyone who is disabled/has long term health issues or has caring responsibilities (kids or elderly relatives) or is an older worker see their lives massively improved if they don't have to waste two hours a day commuting.
That time can be better spent with family commitment or maintaining good physical and mental health.

So if employers really want a diverse workplace and happier employers, removing flexible working is a dumb idea.

Most offices are really inefficient environment anyway where time is wasted on gossip, office politics and unnecessary meetings.

I would never take a job that is fully office based again.

It's so frustrating. I travel 90 minutes each way into central London three days a week to sit at an empty bank of desks and ...make phone calls with the US office that I could do much more effectively from home. Costs me £6900 a year for no benefit to my career or company. I'll look elsewhere next year.

Even though I'm very pro-WFH and have let my team do so as much as they like, I think there's something to this. I'm naturally very introverted and found being in the office exhausting and distracting - still do - but after 2 years WFH during covid, I've come to appreciate the little bits of the day I miss out on on home days. Walking from the station/carpark to the office when it's sunny, my desk neighbour leaving me chocolate to find after my lunch with a note, driving home the long way for a nicer view, putting Midsomer Murders on in the office of a quiet afternoon and all half-heartedly trying to guess the murderer as we work.

I appreciate them much more now I've got a balance - I went almost full WFH a few years pre-Covid because of location, then 100% for 2 years, and now I'm a mix. I still want to hibernate after a day in the office but I appreciate all the bits of life I don't get from my spare room. DH is fully WFH and has been for a long time, and he definitely feels a bit more isolated because of it.

I hated working from home. I went back to the office as soon as I could. Even during the height of lockdown we needed some people in so I was back for at least a couple of days as soon as I was allowed and I've been back 5 days for ages now.

If they insisted on hybrid I might, very unwillingly, agree to one day wfh, but no more than that.

Whilst some employers are taking this approach others are going the other way.

In my sector more are going fully remote/wfh.

I've spoken to severs organisations who are now selling up and downsizing their office space.

My own workplace experimented with hybrid but later this year we will go fully virtual with a few in person meetings across the year.

I absolutely love data! Please tell me more. I would love this job...please let me into the know!!

The opposite. It keeps overheads down

@stillherenow you sound like me. what job do you do if I may ask?

Public sector and still fully WFH, although people can go into the office if they want to

If you work in a call centre the phones literally auto answer, the employees don't choose to 'answer the phone'

If calls aren't getting answered quickly it's far more likely that companies are understaffing to save costs

Depends on the job even before the pandemic my DH worked remotely 3 days a week. He's tech and a programmer so much less needed to be physically in the office he's staying permanently WFH. I imagine things that are more customer focused and collaborative need to be more in the office.

My friend works in HR in her company. She told me when they went WFH the productivity of established staff was fine. They all did their work, often quicker due to less distractions, no problems.
But new staff floundered. Struggled to progress as they couldn't seek peer support in a timely manner (emails took days to be answered etc). So they struggled and left. Staff retention fell off a cliff for new starters, which had never been a problem before.

I work in HR and would say this is true in our company as well. We've really noticed a difference with new staff taking longer to pick things up and lots of anecdotal reports from our new graduates that it's harder to learn the job. Of course, they can always email or have a Zoom call to ask questions but it's those chance encounters, the information you overhear in the office and all the other ways you pick things up in person that are being missed.

We've also seen a huge increase in occupational health referrals at my work, most for mental health reasons which is something we're keeping an eye on. Of course, mental health is being talked about more so perhaps staff are more comfortable at reporting when they have an issue than before. It's a worrying trend though.

Our company hasn't mandated any specific time in the office but we're seeing an upsurge of staff being in. Anecdotally a lot are reporting getting value of being in the office face to face and having a change of scenery/getting out of the house. It's interesting that it seems to have naturally increased without the business asking for it, with most people in at least two days a week.

There are masses of benefits both to individuals and businesses to hybrid working and I think that'll continue but I don't see huge benefits for teams or companies that are fully remote. A hybrid approach seems sensible and to be what most people want.

Different strokes for different folks!
I hate wfh- I feel sluggish and easily distracted at home- but I know plenty who love it. A flexible approach is the way forward for the future.

I think some of this is probably also to do with recruitment issues and the tight labour market. Its simply harder to fill positions like this now. The sort of wage those jobs pay doesn't buy what it used to.

There are loads of different data jobs - data analysts, data scientists, bi developers, data engineers. Then you have related fields like agile scrum managers and product owners. Have a Google of some of these terms and see if any of the jobs appeal to you. There are even companies aimed at getting women in tech specifically.

I work in a big office that's pretty normal occupancy Tues-Weds, fairly busy Mondays. I started there last summer and it was pretty busy midweek, but since September numbers on those days are definitely what one would expect pre-Covid. The tube is not usually quite as rammed as it got at its worst before, but still packed midweek.

They have been incentivising people back more on occasional Fridays by making that a monthly 'team' day for groups to come in. I go in twice a week, but a lot of people have roles (it's real estate) where there's a lot of face to face contact with clients so they come in of their own accord. It helps that it is a really nice workspace.

I think full time WFH is gone except for a few firms, but we're not likely to go back to mandatory five days a week. Although maybe younger people coming into the workforce will gradually push it up to more like 4-5 days a week.

www.businessnewsdaily.com/15259-working-from-home-more-productive.html

I am public sector and our directorate tried to get us back in the office but hot desking as there isn't actually enough space for us - pretty much everyone declined but we go in as and when needed for face to face meetings (I think the last one was September?). I am lucky I live super close to the office but still don't see the point of working there when I can be more productive at home (both work and personal). Even if I do a day at the office I don't do all day as I find the environment (council building) dull and depressing.
DH is also public sector but goes in one day a week (being pushed up to 2x per week after easter). When he WFH he works much longer hours and doesn't take a lunch break and when he's in the office he works a shorter day and buggers off on looooong lunches with colleagues. I am a bit jealous but enjoy the peace at home.

Hyperbole klaxon

On that thread a few of these things were listed as downtime wfh activities.

There was also person after person posting about how much more effective and efficient they are

My happiest memories were made when I started work in an office at 23. I met lifelong friends, had great nights out, learnt from inspirational people - I get WFH at 40 with a couple of kids but l can’t believe it’s good for the future of the company

I do about 1 day a week in the office. My team of 10 do less than this. They’ll go in for training or a team meeting, but nothing else.

It works incredibly well for us. Our performance has never been better, and the team are so much happier. I find it hard to fathom why we spent so much time in the office pre covid.