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Original poster

SERIOUSLY??? People may quit if forced to work from home, Rishi Sunak warns ?

708 replies

R2221 · 26/03/2021 14:13

No Mr Sunak. Working from home saves me 2 FUCKING HOURS of daily commute + rush hour stress + travel costs.

I work from home now. I am more productive, less stressed and happier.

OP posts:
LST · 26/03/2021 14:48

@KirstenBlest

WFH saved me a 2 hr commute (1 hr each way). My colleague saved a 30 min commute

I work at the dining table. My colleague lives in a flatshare and has to work in her bedroom unless her flatmates are out.

I sit on an office chair. My colleague sits on her bed or on the sofa.

I sit on the sofa. Still love working from home.
CloudPop · 26/03/2021 14:49

@ComtesseDeSpair

Many of my junior colleagues who live in houseshares have been living and working in their bedrooms 24/7 for the past year, and haven’t had the opportunity for what Sunak correctly identified as the spontaneous moments which benefit your career - such as a chance conversation with a senior director at the coffee station or the opportunity to attend a meeting you hadn’t previously been invited to. Not everyone’s priorities are spending as little time at work as possible and not having to pay for childcare; and not everyone has the luxury of a comfortable space to work at home.
Quite.
harridan50 · 26/03/2021 14:49

I think it needs to be a mixture of both that suits the individual and the business needs. Also many new young staff with no work space at home prefer to be in an office where they can learn more from experienced colleagues.
Also many of these rented office spaces are parts of property portfolios that are part of pension portfolios that ensure everyones retirement

meow1989 · 26/03/2021 14:49

I hate wfh, I am in a profession when I have always worked within a team not on my todd in front of a computer. I am much less productive and there seems.to be little.dwv9de from work and home (and I only work 3 days, can't imagine full time).

If home working is here to stay I will look for a new role.

DahliaMacNamara · 26/03/2021 14:49

@coachmylife

Tis stupid.

Some people MAY quit if forced to work from home.
Some people MAY quit if forced to return.
Some people MAY quit for totally unrelated reasons.

Conclusion - some people MAY quit.

No news here...

This
JesusIsAnyNameFree · 26/03/2021 14:50

@user1497207191

Agree. But I would imagine the time that these companies decide that all customer services will be done from home full time is also the time they spend the possibly millions on putting better systems in place that will work. They wouldn't spend the money before that decision though.

FlyingBurrito · 26/03/2021 14:50

So essentially your point is that not everyone is the same?

Good to know.

user1497207191 · 26/03/2021 14:50

I don't quite know why you think lecturers in particular might want to stay at home. WFH has made our jobs much, much harder.

Maybe because my son showed me a screenshot of a comment by one of his lecturers saying how he's enjoying "working from home" in France and not having to spend thousands on renting accommodation in the UK, and suggesting he's hoping that working from home becomes the norm for courses that don't "need" face to face teaching like his subject.

Or that one of his other lecturers just posts up links to last year's recorded videos which are logged down as "live" lecturers, even though the lecturer only "attends" for the first couple of minutes to give the link and a very brief introduction, and doesn't stay around to take questions etc at the end.

MarshaBradyo · 26/03/2021 14:50

His points will be right for some not all

It’s not hard to get people respond to wfh differently is it?

SchrodingersImmigrant · 26/03/2021 14:51

He has a oint. Firms should have some office space still, not jsut gove it up completely. Wfh works for many, but it is really hard for others.
The point about city centre trade is valid too. Many places, hence lits of employment, relies on trade from city centre/office areas people.

There is nothing wrong on pointing these things out

ClarkeGriffin · 26/03/2021 14:51

I love wfh. I don't want to have to go back in, but I don't think anyone should be forced to wfh if they don't want to. Let people have choices. My choice shouldn't affect other people or vice versa. I shouldn't have to work in an office just because others want to.

Gah81 · 26/03/2021 14:52

Some people love it, some people hate it. Is always useful to consider that others may have perspectives that differ from your own.

Cannotgarden · 26/03/2021 14:52

Our team has many people who hate WFH because they're either single and very very lonely or have families that mean they can't focus. It's not all roses.

Dontforgetyourbrolly · 26/03/2021 14:53

OP it's not Rishi's fault you took a job with a horrible commute
And bully for you that its working out , for many others it isnt.
Cities and towns need to get moving again to save jobs - not all can work from home. Coffee shops , delis, shoe repairs , etc etc

user1497207191 · 26/03/2021 14:53

@harridan50

I think it needs to be a mixture of both that suits the individual and the business needs. Also many new young staff with no work space at home prefer to be in an office where they can learn more from experienced colleagues. Also many of these rented office spaces are parts of property portfolios that are part of pension portfolios that ensure everyones retirement
In a lot of roles it's not just a "preference" of the young staff to learn from experienced colleagues, it's absolutely essential, as they need to be trained on the job and need pretty close supervision and management to ensure their work is up to standard.

Eg, even a graduate with an accountancy degree isn't an accountant, and in fact, probably couldn't even prepare the simplest of tax returns or a set of accounts without "on the job" training as the reality of the work in the real world is very different to the academic knowledge of a degree.

expectopelargonium · 26/03/2021 14:54

I think he's got it a bit arse-about-face, hasn't he? Surely there will be just as many people keen to continue working from home, but whose employer insists that they go back to the office.

NotMeekNotObedient · 26/03/2021 14:54

I love it. Maybe more of a London commuter opinion than in other areas. £5k back in my pocket a year not having to be spent on a train ticket, 2.5hrs of my day back. I would like the occasional visit to the office but honestly, what difference does it make if I sit at a desk at home or at work in an office - the company says it costs them £15k a year for my desk. Win win for all.

But for those who don't want to work from home, of course, that's also fine, we all work best in different ways. Industry and your job will have a lot to do with this too.

Dontforgetyourbrolly · 26/03/2021 14:54

I think also if you took a job on the proviso you would work in a office then your employer has every right to insist you do so . If you dont want to , there are a 100 people willing to fill your space .
If you want to wfh then look for a specific home working role

NothingIsWrong · 26/03/2021 14:54

Already did. Quit and found a job where I work in an office. How can you not see some people DO NOT HAVE suitable space to work at home?!

user1497207191 · 26/03/2021 14:55

@Dontforgetyourbrolly

OP it's not Rishi's fault you took a job with a horrible commute And bully for you that its working out , for many others it isnt. Cities and towns need to get moving again to save jobs - not all can work from home. Coffee shops , delis, shoe repairs , etc etc
And as I posted up thread, public transport can't survive without the commuter market. We'd have barely any trains without the lucrative season ticket market of commuters. The Govt is already having to massively subsidise the reduced level of trains operating. The train network can't survive on discretionary/leisure transport market and isn't geared up for it either.
nokidshere · 26/03/2021 14:55

I’m also getting very sceptical of this universal view pretty much everyone now seems to have that they’re so much more efficient working at home than they were in the office. Every time in the past year that I’ve had to make contact with my bank, a utility company, an insurance company, the council, or the customer service department of just about any organisation, I’ve been treated to a recorded message telling me that I need to be patient during this difficult time as staff are working from home and have had to adapt their ways of working to suit, so to expect long delays. If everyone’s being so much more efficient, why aren’t customers experiencing a better service?

Absolutely this in spades! Customer service is rubbish right now for many companies. Even trying to get someone to answer a phone is a joke.

Cannotgarden · 26/03/2021 14:56

@user1497207191

I don't quite know why you think lecturers in particular might want to stay at home. WFH has made our jobs much, much harder.

Maybe because my son showed me a screenshot of a comment by one of his lecturers saying how he's enjoying "working from home" in France and not having to spend thousands on renting accommodation in the UK, and suggesting he's hoping that working from home becomes the norm for courses that don't "need" face to face teaching like his subject.

Or that one of his other lecturers just posts up links to last year's recorded videos which are logged down as "live" lecturers, even though the lecturer only "attends" for the first couple of minutes to give the link and a very brief introduction, and doesn't stay around to take questions etc at the end.

Your son should take this up with the Dean of education at the institution because there are rules around what classes a contact hour and your example here means the lecturer isn't meeting those requirements. The uni would want to know. The vast majority of lecturers have been working incredible workloads this year to transfer to online learning and are just about to enter hundreds of hours of staring at screens to mark exams. It's been awful and the return to face to face can't come soon enough!
Hollyhead · 26/03/2021 14:57

I would quit jobs if I had to wfh full time, it's an awful way for me to live.

GirlInterruptedAgain · 26/03/2021 14:58

What about the rest of the family ( if you have one) who have to tiptoe around the ‘worker’ in their own home?? Not everyone’s home is adapted to have a separate work space in it. I’m sure squeezing under the stairs /corner of the living room/end if the bed has worked for most folk right now out of necessity, but I don’t think it’s a good long term solution for everyone. Some people enjoy the camaraderie of their work colleagues, they may be the only other people someone sees. Or perhaps it’s the only break from caring responsibilities they get? I think it would be about 50/50 split.

Unsure33 · 26/03/2021 14:58

This is just a serious topic for discussion.

I prefer going into the office .

My husband prefers working from home.

if staff want to work from home they technically have to make a request to their employer - Perhaps a mix will work for a lot of people and save travel costs .

I think we will have lots of empty retail and office units in town centres and personally I think there should be some forward thinking and turn them into forward thinking living accommodation with eco credentials , shared communal areas , etc . It may be great for housing for young people who want to be at the heart of a town and stop the need for more building of fill in housing

Now is the time to think hard and think outside the box and invest to create jobs .

some change could be for the better .