Do you ever WFH in bed?

[Spocyfriedchi]

I have an office job. All I need is my laptop. Yes a big screen helps, but my job is mostly excel and then some word and PowerPoint.

Someday (especially when I have anxiety) I like working in bed and feeling all cosy.

Does anyone else do this?

No - especially when using excel - I like to have two screens and struggle to use a mouse in bed.
This is why people who work from home get a bad reputation.

When my anxiety is really really bad I just WFH. When I'm feeling okay I go into the office.

No because i get called at random times throughout the day by people and usually have a lot of meetings . I don't see it as an issue if you aren't needing to be on camera.

Wearing a dressing gown or hoodie on a Teams call is ridiculous and unprofessional. Would you wear that in the office? Probably not.

It might be fine for informal meetings, but for important calls or client-facing meetings, you should dress as you would in the office—or at least wear something presentable on camera.

If it wouldn’t be acceptable in person, it’s probably not suitable for a video call either.

"Your employer won't have customers on a dead planet."

How ridiculous.

No, my bed is only used for 2 things, and work isn't one of them.

To suggest the “planet will die” because a few people put the heating on is more stupidity than I can possibly handle

This is like saying, "Sorry, my internet is down, so I can't do anything." Yes, you can—drive to the office.

"The only place I could work was under a duvet." Correction—you have an office, and I'm sure it's plenty warm there.

If that's the case, how come we keep being exhorted to turn the heating down and layer up?

@LoveLifeBeHappy maybe people are just trying to love life be happy 🤷🏻‍♀️.

Couldn't help myself. Sorry

By whom?

Yeah, I used to do it all the time when I worked from home, cos I just couldn’t be arsed. But I did hate working from home, as I was originally office based, but the pandemic hit, and we never went back to the office. So, as soon as I could find a new office based job, I quit, and went back to the office. Much prefer working at work.

A decade ago we'd all be going into the office and think nothing of it. Any "anxiety" was just part and parcel of normal life and emotions. What role models are we giving our youngsters? We're not teaching them any resilience skills. When you feel a bit anxious don't worry about going to work, keep your PJs on, sit in bed with a laptop and "do what you can". Bless. I'm not against working from home, it definitely offers flexibility, but I do think we need to toughen up a bit.

Or those with actually anxiety just wouldn't have been able to work at all.

Yes, it's bemusing how often people think it's a binary choice between remote work and working in person. Pretty big third possibility being missed out there!

It's not new information that people are sometimes unable to work at all because of workplace norms and conditions either. We knew in 2019 that structural factors pushed some workers out. But covid made some people forget that and also anxiety didn't exist in the 2010s, apparently.

I mean I don't want to get into details about it, but there were times it was getting so bad that at the weekends I couldn't get out of bed. I didn't want to get out of bed.

Once when I was in the office, I remember some friends inviting me out for dinner. The anxiety and instructive thoughts were so bad that I just couldn't and I went home immediately when the work day ended

I honestly can't recall anyone in my earlier work life not being able to work due to anxiety issues. Maybe they cited other reasons, who knows. Or maybe they developed coping mechanisms. We've all had to deal with anxiety at some point, often quite frequently.

You may not have known. They might have just been off sick.

I've worn a hoodie at work, a number of times. Company branded and all. I've also worn non-branded ones.

You didn't know them at work because they couldn't work

And yet ONS figures show there is a growing trend in the economically inactive due to anxiety, depression & bad nerves particularly amongst younger generations:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peoplenotinwork/economicinactivity/articles/risingillhealthandeconomicinactivitybecauseoflongtermsicknessuk/2019to2023

So it is way more prevalent nowadays.

What these figures certainly do not say is that a decade ago, 'we'd all be going into the office and think nothing of it'.

No fair point, but what it does show is that more people were working. So despite the current ability to work remotely or hybrid approach, which should help to keep people in work, more people are now not working. It's been on the decline since before covid, that's just exacerbated it.

Yes, there are wider issues that have led to our shrinking workforce. It would likely be even worse without the rise in home based and more flexible working. But structural barriers to working in person absolutely did exist a decade ago.

But my point isn't about whether we go into the office or not, my point is that even though we may have had anxiety, or not felt like socialising that day, we still went to work. Whether that was in the office or not. Most of us didn't hide under our duvets, we got on with it. That is what I feel is lacking today and I don't think it's beneficial for individuals or society. Any emotion nowadays is seen as an issue rather than a normal human response.

And that point is wrong. Because there were people who weren't able to access work in 2015. We did not all go into the office a decade ago and think nothing of it.