If you work from home, do you actually work?

[fallacy]

I'm a SAHM but I have many friends that work full time. A lot of the time they wfh and from what I can tell, not a lot of work actually gets done.

I'm jealous.

Dh works WFH on odd days. He gets more done in 3 hours at home than he does during 9 in the office, minus a 90 min each way commute. He can also play Pop Master on radio 2 (dials into the mail office, they all down tools and join in); the washing is done, hung out, brought in, and ironed, the kitchen is cleaned, rubbish shorted and evening meal sorted, toddle round the shops to pick up any bits and bobs, have a nap and watch the cricket.

I do yes.

I do sometimes work a shorter day to enable me to run errands or attend appointments but as I work flexi time I just book the hours worked.

I teach online and it's pretty full on.

I do one day a week, as does my DH. I fit chores into my day like hanging washing out, sorting a drawer out, making casserole or soup. It's bliss! I spent 10 years in a busy frontline role before and never had time for lunch breaks etc and burnt out.

I don't see how it's any different to people taking five mins to chat with colleagues, doing a tea/coffee round, collecting the team lottery money etc which are accepted norms in office type work.

Not now but I used to do half my week from home. I was more productive than I was in the office it was call centre type work so measured and we had objectives so it would have been glaringly obvious if I hadn’t been working.

My children were at school but they went to after school club when I was WFH we weren’t allowed to have kids there.

I work from 7am-5:30pm from home. I work the whole time. Sometimes I work overnight too.

Another home worker here working hard on Mumsnet

I worked for the company for well over a decade and got fairly senior and so had the bargaining power to ask - when I had kids 12 years ago I switched to home working and never went back to office based.

Incidentally working from home is not the same as being a SAHM - my kids were in nursery prior to school as working/making calls with small children in the house is impossible in my opinion. Now they're bigger I can work with them lounging around during holidays etc and they know that if my phone rings to keep quiet.

I'm a project manager so I can email and phone from anywhere really. I will travel to clients or meetings in the office if needed but mostly I just direct my own work and get on with it. I get a lot of work done, even with Mumsnet open on a tab, and if I didn't my job would be under question! Of course managers can't check up every thing I do at home, but at the end of the day it's easy to see if deadlines are missed or projects overrun.

I WFH a couple of days a week. Get loads more done than working in the office. No distractions, nobody asking me questions all day. I'm really productive WFH.

I wfh and I'm actually trying to shorten my hours because I'm working too much.

I work hard but I also take half an hour here and there to go for a run or have a cuppa. It balances out with not having to attend pointless meetings.

I worked from home if I wasn’t in meetings. My laptop would get turned on at 5:30am and often not closed down until 1-2am. But with 6,000 employees in my area, there was plenty of work to be done.

Our entire company works remotely as we don't have offices. We're in the charitable sector.

I definitely do actual work. I spend all day responding to customer emails and taking phone calls.

The world of work has moved on, it isn’t the Gordon Gecko era anymore.

Most sensible employers measure employees on output, not presenteeism and aren’t remotely bothered if you work flexibly provided the job is done and done well. (Fully recognise some jobs can’t be done from home but lots can).

In common with most of my friends group, I work in a well paid professional job and sometimes from home. We wouldn’t continue to be well paid if we took the piss and didn’t work.

Sure there will be some who take advantage but just like some SAHMs probably spend their day watching daytime tv, let’s not judge the majority by the few. 😉

Like PP I’m self employed and freelance so if I’m unproductive the effects are on me. I get far far more done at home than in the office - open plan is my idea of hell.

I'm on a time tracker with hugely tight turnarounds so, yes, I get a lot done. I have a dedicated office in the garden.

I do still get interrupted and dragged away from time to time. It drives me up the wall tbh and I sometimes think I would rather be in an office but then you just get interrupted by colleagues instead. I refuse to work in an office for this reason. God, I hate being interrupted and talked to all the time!! Can never get into my flow in an office.

Dh works from home. He does emails and computer stuff from about 8 until 11, then bugger all from 11-2 (goes shopping, plays computer games, potters in the garden) then does conference calls and emails from 2-6.

Yes, of course, though my wfh days are my short days. I don’t work full days those days as I do the school runs. I do work in the evenings though and I work about 7-8 the rest of the week. My work is flexible though so I don’t have to work any set number of hours.

For most people, work just needs to get done. If you spend 3 hours at a long lunch, that’s fine, but you still have to meet the same deadlines and the time has to come from somewhere.

Of course I’m working

I go into my home office and work just like if I was in a regular office

I tend to do some housework and watch a bit of tele on a working from home day TBH. That's usually because I've completed all the work I need to do on my other days though.

I work from home full time and I work harder than when my job was office based. I used to have a long commute so I'd end up knackered, being less tired means I get more done.

Nope, my partner does his meetings but watches Netflix apart from that.

I hated my job though so I did fuck all, it was a day off. It wasn't a very busy job so no-one noticed.

I work longer hours when I work from home. Only difference is I spend 20 mins In the car to pick my child up from school.

I've wfh fur over 20 years. I may be different to some though as I'm a freelancer in a creative industry so have no line managers or official 'bosses' other than companies I'm currently working with.

I have a deadline to meet and as long as I meet it then all is good.

Sometimes I have to do all day meetings elsewhere or business trips away from home.

My dcs are older now, but I was fortunate to always be able to pick up and drop off at school.

These days I walk the dog, maybe a bit of a good shop. Go home and work for a few hours. Then make dinner - teen with the teens emotional dramas etc, then go back to work for the evening. A lot of my workload gets done late at night or at the weekends.

I would say that no, 9-5 only a few hours of work gets done but overall in a week I'm putting the hours when most people are relaxing or out.

I WFH most days. Emails and phone are never switched off so I'm always working. I travel a lot too. Some days I don't do much, but most days it's full on and if I'm not doing my work it's very apparent to the bosses.

I work. I also do other things - stick a wash on, empty the dishwasher. The equivalent of going out to get coffee or stopping for a chat with colleagues in the office. Plus I save two hours of commuting time. I tend to spend a bit of that going for a run but I'm still at my desk for longer than the average office day.

I'm in professional services do I have to complete timesheets. If I didn't do my work I would soon be found out.