Forced return to office - anyone else?

[Flexipecs]

My work has announced we’re all being forced back into the office two days a week. I’m a sole parent of primary school aged children (no help from ex). If I’m forced to go into the office I’ll have to reduce my working hours and I’ll be financially worse off.

I’m going to contact my union but has anyone else had this problem and did you successfully challenge it?

There’s zero benefit to me being in the office. My stats and performance are high. I actually think I’m more productive at home because I’m not being distracted so often. I’ve worked for the company for a very long time and I’m really disappointed at this decision (to put it mildly).

I suggest you try discussing the position with them and explain that you were able to increase your hours due to working from home and that if you are no longer able to do so you will need to reduce them again but that's not what you want.

It would seem counter productive for them to lose you for part of the time

This 'younger employees' thing is trotted out all the time on here. When we actually hear from younger workers themselves, they're a mixed bag. As one would expect, with them not being a hive mind.

Additionally, plenty of younger workers face structural barriers to in person person just as some older workers do too. They seem to be forgotten in these discussions though.

@StormShadow yes, just as anyone who raises questions is a 'dinosaur' (I know you didn't say this but it is the quick answer for a few on this thread). I agree that many people young and old face structural barriers and really benefit from working from home. However many people, particularly young people benefit from face to face interaction rather than being isolated wfh. It is more convenient for people to wfh but this does not necessarily benefit the employer.

There's a massive difference between saying some younger employees and younger employees per se. Virtually nobody disputes that some people do much better in an office environment than remote, but it is quite telling when people who make that argument so often have to be reminded to qualify it.

The fact is, people's experiences and preferences are different. Generalisations get us absolutely nowhere.

In terms of benefits to the employer, this too is a complex picture because employers are less likely to be able to enforce their preferred conditions than they used to be. An employer might feel they're worse off with a fully or partially remote staff than they were in 2019. They might be right. That's a completely different question to whether they're actually able to get suitable staff in the office at the wage they want to pay.

Too many people think it's a case of people working in home or in the office. Actually, there's a third option, which is people not doing the job at all. There are some employers who've clocked this and some who haven't at all.

@ameanoldscene if you dint know about your employees that work from home because you haven’t ‘seen’ them in the office, that says more about you as a boss than about them tbh.

Flexible working hours (when most people used to work in the office) was seen as impossible when it started too. Plenty of talk around the fact people wouldn’t see each other, customers wouldn’t get the service they wanted etc…
Move on quite a few years and we all know that companies that have very rigid working hours are not getting the best out of people….

And in the same way, some companies have been working with people wfh since the start (and way way before the pandemic) and have incredible results too.
The major issue here is management adapting to new situations. Not the employees for managing their own hours.

Too many people think it's a case of people working in home or in the office. Actually, there's a third option, which is people not doing the job at all. There are some employers who've clocked this and some who haven't at all

There's also a fourth option - if you don't like WFH or don't want to, and your office is too far away to go to every day, or isn't available to you, there are co-working hubs that you can work at. You meet people and have a workspace.

Co-working spaces aren’t suitable if you work with personal client data.

I quite often have to phone third parties and provide names, addresses, DOBs, references as security. Or I could be on an internal call discussing a clients affairs. It’s not appropriate for me to do that in an environment with people that aren’t my colleagues.

Yes my previous flatmate used to overhear these things when we worked from home in the living room during covid, but I was quite confident she didn’t give a toss about my clients nor me hers 😆

People are commenting that this parent shouldn’t be surprised to be asked to do what was the norm pre-covid, but ignore pertinent points:

• OP has explained she is a lone parent who is struggling. This may not have been the case pre-covid. And even of it was, empathy should be afforded imho.
• we are also facing the biggest cost of living crisis in living memory as well as a child care crisis. This means there are not simple solutions, and for those that have those privileges, we cannot assume they are widely and routinely available.

No advice. I feel for you. Wfh works well for many professions and businesses. It can offer a better work/life balance for employees, cut down on travel costs and improve mental health all round. As well as increasing productivity for employers. I empathise and hope you can work something out.

Could you make up the hours you loose when in the office on the days you are at home? My work has let me do flexi working and I do some work once my LO is in bed. Worth asking, as then you wouldn’t have to reduce your total hours? Good luck!

Well maybe people should think about child care and plan for it before having children, instead of blithely imagining nothing will change in their workplace. Just a thought.

I have to go in 1/2 days a week. Don’t get me wrong, I’d be horrified if it was anymore than that as I also have two young kids but…before covid I worked 5 days in the office. That is the contract I signed, that is the job I applied for. It’s tough luck. You can request flexibility but you are not entitled to it.

The OPs children are 9 and 10. She would've been TTC the first in probably 2012. Short of engaging the sevrices of Mystic Meg, exactly what planning do you imagine she could've engaged in back then that would've prepared her for the situation she faces in 2023?

@ismu probably depends on the team. Mine’s just gone through a horrible consultation period, restructure and are working with new people with a new manager. A couple of colleagues have made it toxic and I’m now in role trying to fix it. It needs face to face one or two days a week. Dh is a manager solely from home and that works in his job.

Some people work better when WFH for whatever reason. Some people work worse for whatever reason. A good manager sees this and works with it. A poor manager just makes a blanket decision and berates whoever is the underperformer.

I don’t know, maybe because things change? The mentality that pre pandemic is the blueprint for what life should be is mind blowing. Working remotely should be a staple in the working world moving forward.

Exactly. Good managers realise that everyone works differently.

You manage the person, and their output. Some people need to be in the office, others don't.

Except she actually applied for a job working in an office not remotely. That happened because of covid and now company are bringing staff back on reduced days which seems perfectly reasonable. Tbh if DC’s dad is not helping at least with wrap around childcare two days a week then she should be getting maintenance stopped at source.

Everything is more expensive now

The problem is ... in my experience ... I know a few people who work from home right now... that ARE slackers! This lot are all supposed to be full time!

I know two neighbours ... One has been working from home for one and a half years, and she has 2 to 3 hour 'lunches' twice a week ... and she has at least four to seven hours of work time a week, when she has mates and family around. ALSO, I hear her working outside in the garden, speaking and laughing really loudly ... with personal conversations with her mates - or her bloke, for half an hour to an hour... that are absolutely nothing to do with work.

I also know someone else who's actually running a youtube channel and they do between 14 and 16 hours a week of their YouTube stuff in their 'supposed' work hours.

I also know someone else who's got two children at home all the time aged 2 and 3... yet she 'works' 40 hours a week (from home...) How can she possibly be doing her job properly when she's got two children of that age at home all the time? Also she spends at least 8 to 10 hours a week of her working hours OUT of the home with the kids, (so not working obvs!)

I also know someone else who works (supposedly full time,) from home who doesn't even roll out of bed till 10am ... and then fucks off out to the bowling alley or the pub or their mates at half three in the afternoon ...

So don't even try and pretend to me that people are 'working really hard' at home, because a lot of people are swinging the lead and taking the piss.

Anybody who's ever worked in any workplace ever - knows there are slackers and people who swing the lead and take the piss, and other people carry them. Can you imagine how fucking bone idle and lazy and workshy these people are when they've got absolutely nobody supervising them?!

People need to start going back into the office two days a week for the first 6 months, three days for the next 6 months, and then after that full time again ... Get your arses back out into work you lazy feckers!

MANY 'work from home' people have become lazy - even the ones trying to pretend that's not them!

But...so what?

Thats a problem for management at their company, not you.

Maybe you should start minding your own business and stop paying attention to what everyone else is doing and get in with your own life.

You seem to know alot of people who don’t so say do there job properly. Get a life.

Lol no. Complain more, its funny.

@PurpleButterflyWings this is hilarious 😂 ! Think you need to get out more 😉

I've got the sort of job where it would be very visible very quickly if I was slacking. Each task needs to be completed (or at least started) promptly, if I decided to have a slack week, I would be outed by Tuesday morning at the latest