To think nowadays, working from home should be allowed as much as possible

[welliesandleaves]

I do a job that could just as easily be done at home most days as in the office. My senior colleague feels exactly the same as I do. Our job involves working on our own most of the time, has absolute deadlines, has a very definite outcome that can't be fudged in any way, and can be done best in peace and quiet.
Yet our boss, who actually has very little to do with our work but is just someone we officially report to, is very unwilling to allow working from home.
I know other people who are in a similar boat.

Surely, nowadays, with remote access, smartphones, email etc. working from home should be the norm in a lot of jobs, not an exception or a favour. It would cut down on rush hour traffic, allow for a better work/life balance and also bring a bit of life back into a lot of communities which are like ghost towns during the day.

AIBU to feel like this?

In theory for certain jobs it is perfectly doable and should be done. It must be difficult for a boss, though, to permit one person to do it and not another. You know who would step up to the plate and who would be on MN all day, but are you still allowed to say that?! It depends on the job, too. Staying at home to bash out a proposal or document makes sense: you have a deadline and can get stuck in without commuting etc. A more routine job would I think become more difficult to do effectively without the "perks" of colleague interaction and office whatnot.

artandco
I'm glad it worked for you and still works, but you must surely recognise that your situation is very unusual and I suspect is as much down to the nature of your children rather than them knowing the routine from newborn.

Young children have demands. To have two children who occupy themselves quietly for 3 hrs is quite unusual and I think it is reasonable for a manager to question it.

Where I work we can work from home one day a week but we MUST have childcare in place for that day.
It works for the company because if there are tube strikes or snow days we can't use the excuse of not being able to get in the office to skive off.
If an employee has a doctors appointment they won't have to leave early or arrive late.
You can stay in for deliveries and not need to take time off.
We have instant messenger on our laptops so your boss can see that you're online and contact you if they need to.
It's so nice to have a day off from that horrible commute and have time to clean the house before I pick up DS from nursery so I don't need to spend so much time doing it at the weekend!
And yes, I'm more productive because I'm not getting interrupted as much as I do in the office.
I couldn't do it five days a week though, I'd find it too lonely but a day or two is the perfect balance.

one of the reasons that protracted unemployment leads to depression is the lack of socialisation that you get in the workplace. working from home is very solitary and isolating compared to working in an office environment. the internet/social media/internet shopping has already increased isolation, i could not imagine doing all my work at home, ordering everything online and just keeping in touch via social media.
thank goodness i work in a job that could never be done from home

There does seem to be a huge amount of variability in whether people can or do get things done while at home.

Part of it's down to personality, part down to company culture and motivation.

If you personally, or if some individuals you work with, don't perform well at home, that's one thing.

If you believe that none of your team/company would get anything done at home then perhaps you need to examine your company culture.

YANBU. I work from home, have done for the last four and a half years. The company was based in NY and is now based in Las Vegas. In 'business school' terms it's a 'virtual organization' -- some people are based in LA, some in NY, some in Vegas, then there's me here in the UK and there's a team in the Philippines. There is a 'head office' but only two team members work out of it regularly. We have a video call every week to update everyone, but otherwise we all have our jobs to keep this company going and we just get to it.

You've got clear deadlines, definitive KPIs to measure productivity -- in that case working from home should be an option!

if you believe that none of your team/company would get anything done at home then perhaps you need to examine your company culture.

I think that sums it up. if you soley employ people that when trusted to work from home and manage their time effectively would take the first opportunity toslack off and not do what they need to do, then you need to look very closely at your hiring policies! I just don't get why people would abuse it (though I know some do) - I have a certain amount if shit to get done in any given week and I plough through it - wherever I am.

At the moment I wfh 5 days a week and although I virtually chat with colleagues, I agree that it's is nice to have at least a day or 2 in the office to mix with people. i get far less done though with all the coffee breaks, lunches etc that yiubhave to go along with rather than do when suits you.

However, I don't get the isolation thing. When I am actually working I want to be isolated as its conducive to me doing my job but in the morning I talk to people on the school run, I may pop out for a coffee mid morning and usually meet a friend, I may meet friends for lunch. I chat with the neighbour if I see them, DP when he gets home, children when they get back. Other parents if they go to evening clubs etc. go to my own evening activities, book clubs etc. in fact sometimes I like going into the office to get away from everyone! it might be more isolating if you didn't have kids I suppose and the whole social setup that goes with that.

Interesting thread.

I work from home occasionally and find that my productivity level varies enormously. Sometimes I get absolutely loads done and other times I get distracted and wander around making toast. Impossible to predict, so I save working from home for when I have tradesmen coming round or I have the sort of very concentrated discrete task that is hard to do in a noisy office.

Tbt - of course it's normal for 4 and 5 year olds to be able to occupy themselves for 3 hrs. Sure they might ask odd question but generally most I know will happily do that. Many will go off into bedrooms at home and play without parent sitting next to them.

I have sylvanian families in a dolls house, and knex construction in my office atm. Both which are quiet and they will happily do that together whilst I finish up. They are in school 6 hrs now so I get all long phone calls and main thinking and research done then, so can just do writing up and emails with them around. They aren't forced to be silent, so talk to each other as they play.

They were taught from young when they needed to be self occupied as we constantly drilled it into them. When smaller We would take them outside for 2-3 hrs first so they were exercised and worn energy out ( swim/ parks/ etc), then they would happily play together with toys whisky we worked a bit, nap, and we would take back out later. They weren't expected to be silent 12hrs a day.

Where I work we can work from home one day a week but we MUST have childcare in place for that day

This was also mentioned by a PP and I'm genuinely interested in how it works. Hopefully most won't, but surely there's always going to be someone who, once allowed to WFH, will simply cancel the childcare to save money?

art then I have abnormal children.

There is no way I could guarantee 3hrs of quality work time with my 6 year old around (and I have a garden office separate from the house), especially if he's just come out from school.

if they did and still got their work done to the required standard then so what I guess.

I think most people would find it would quickly drive them insane though, especially with little ones. I don't massively see the problem with older kids coming home from school and getting on with their homework for an hour or two before the parent (s) knock off though. I sometimes cover other timezones and work from home in out evenings while DP is in charge if the dc, but they're still in the house and I can still have a break and say goodnight, have the odd chat etc, it works quite well. Again, its pretty normal nowadays and many chidlren are used to having to be quiet when a parent is on a conf call etc as other posters have said. Mine know to come I to my office quietly if I'm working and check whetehr I'm on the phone before asking me a question, its not really a big deal.

of course it's normal for 4 and 5 year olds to be able to occupy themselves for 3 hrs

Yep. For every 4-year-old playing Sylvanian Families for a 3-hour stretch , there are a million 4-year-olds who would sit slumped in front of the television, swipe at a tablet, or be getting into trouble (eg intricate and extensive permanent marker design on floor tiles, which was one of dd's better ones...).

I take your point, foragogo, but surely it's not really in the spirit of the agreement? After all if staff commit to something to get a WFH deal with every intention of breaking that commitment and then claiming "it doesn't matter," doesn't that say something about their attitude to the job?

And what happens if WFH has to be withdrawn for the (hopefully very few) who've abused it? They're not going to like that ...

I think the point I'm making is that not many people would be foolish enough to regularly work from home while in charge of small babies or young children because it is very hard and stressful and not really fair on the children. But if they have unusually quiet and cooperative little ones or are able to do their work in the evening instead, or the children are older, then, really, so what? if you've signed a contract saying you won't do it then, fair enough, dont, but if its the odd day or you can make it work, why dictate?

Trust people to manage their own time if its appropriate for the role, if they take the piss or don't get the work done, get rid of them or make them come into the office. My experience though is that it's a vanishingly small number that do take the piss nowadays in my industry as wfh is well embedded now in (most) corporate cultures and many people are consultants, contractors, self employed etc so its not in their interests to use it to slack off. Personally as an employer, I don't really care what personal arrangements are going on in their house as long as they can get the work done well and in a timely fashion and can make quiet calls when they need to.

I work from home and have done for about five years now. I used childcare until my youngest was 8 years old - only then could they be trusted not to start screaming in the background when I was on the phone. I still got a lot of interruptions however but generally managed with it just being the school holidays. Their holidays were rubbish however and largely involved me telling them to be quiet and go away.

I think there's something to be said for being watched actually whilst working. I'd do far more if I were sitting in an open plan office. There are far too many distractions at home. It's also very isolating. You can't really invite anybody round so most of the time you're sat on your own for hours. Some days I find it really hard to get motivated. And my home is no longer my home so to speak. There's always work here. If I'm ill I never get a day off - I've to at least cover the emails because lets face it, you're at home it's easy. Unless I'm unconscious, I'm expected to keep things ticking over.

The good side? I don't pay childcare in term time and can drop off and pick up. I can take an hour out for a play or something. I can load the dishwasher, washing machine if I get time but mostly I'm sitting amongst morning mess until I finish work if it's piling up.

So for me there are good sides and down sides. I think a good mix would be better e.g. one or two days a week working from home.

I think for the majority just the option of 1-2 days working from home a week would be the ideal. It would mean no commute 1-2 days, still in the office over half the time, and the benefits or both worlds.

I agree Art. I wouldn't want to be working from home everyday. Also, no matter how self contained the job there are times when you have to sit down with other colleagues to discuss something or to bounce ideas around.

But an awful lot of jobs could easily incorporate a couple of days working from home. If an employee isn't producing the goods on those days, or emailing reports in at 10pm instead of by COB, or you can hear children shouting in the background when you ring them even though there was a strict agreement that childcare would be in place, then an employer should be free to cancel a wfh arrangement.

My dh says his favourite time to work is actually 6pm-midnight/1am. He often does this as he is a night owl and has offices in Australia so he can actually be in contact with them with the time differences. Otherwise at 9am all of Australia are in bed!
However That's obviously from home as he can be working from living room in pjs at midnight in comfort of home, which he wouldn't be in office.

Puzzled - RE: childcare - it's written in your contract that childcare must be in place. I think in reality if you have very small children and can't concentrate and get found out then you'll get in trouble. With older children who entertain themselves management turn a blind eye (in my experience).

Yes I completely get that, Gnomette. I'm also genuinely pleased when I hear about this working out well for some, and agree that proper selection is important in the first place

I guess my reservations are based on seeing the problems employers can have when it's abused, though, and the difficulties in rescinding the WFH agreement or even having to fire staff. IME people don't tend to like being told "no" and not everyone takes the same view over accepting responsibility

Could bosses not just set targets for their staff for what they expect them to reasonably achieve in the week, then leave them to it as long as they were available for email/ phone contact? Then why would it matter if people were running errands/collecting kids from school but then worked when the kids were in bed or when they were watching cartoons or is that too trusting?

I work from home full time for a small company and I work like this ^ My boss knows how much work she's expecting me to do in the hours that I have and generally it doesn't matter when I do it. And like Artandco my DC have generally amused themselves from the age of 3, even though 2 of them are of the spirited variety. I think it's just something that DC get used to when they have to.

I think the point I'm making is that not many people would be foolish enough to regularly work from home while in charge of small babies or young children because it is very hard and stressful and not really fair on the children. But if they have unusually quiet and cooperative little ones or are able to do their work in the evening instead, or the children are older, then, really, so what?

I have a toddler and work from home. Mostly I work during her nap or after bedtime. If I have a push and need more time I put a bunch of her favorite toys in her crib to play with for an extra hour or two, or if DH is home kick them both out. You find ways to make it work without being stressful.

There's toys she only gets to play with during work (and they're good ones like electric pianos and a bucket of assorted toys I cycle out, so I think she comes to look forward to my calls when she's awake. She's happy to kick me out of the room as soon as I set her in the crib and let's me know when she's done. That's about the time I wrap it up until she goes to bed.

I agree with tbtc - Art's children really are very, very unusual. I would wager parents of 99.9% of pre-schoolers cannot focus on their work and look after pre-schoolers at the same time.
LaughingGnomette - your company sounds like an ideal balance.

Soooooo much of this depend both on the job, and on the personality of the people though. there are people on my team who rarely go into the office, and there are others who refuse to work at home, liking to see 'being at work' as something that is separate from their home.

Back - accept they aren't unusual as a bunch of people above also say they work from home with small Children. Tbtc said her child is 6. That is not a pre schooler.